


In Vino Veritas

by SlimReaper



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Drinking Games, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Time, Fluff and Smut, He's come so far and I just fucking love that okay, I maintain my headcanon that Ratchet reads romance novels fight me, M/M, Ratchet you should really make an appointment with Rung, Sticky Sexual Interfacing, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Very Competent Drift/Deadlock, but we all know that ain't happening, dratchet - Freeform, iopele, not just in the berth people
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2020-06-25 22:03:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 30,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19754668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlimReaper/pseuds/SlimReaper
Summary: Ratchet's been there and done that--everyone knows this.Ratchet's a party animal--the famous Party Ambulance, in fact, and everyone knows this too.Ratchet's tried pretty much every crazy thing imaginable in the berth, and probably a lot of unimaginable things, too. Everyone, literallyeveryoneknows this.What no one knows is thatwhat everyone knowsabout Ratchet is dead wrong. It's a carefully crafted lie that Ratchet's constructed over the centuries until it's grown so out-of-control that he doesn't even know how to stop it anymore.And Drift's about to discover the truth.





	1. Secrets

**Author's Note:**

> With many thanks to the awesome Enfilade for permission to use Truth Or Drink!

Ratchet was most of the way through his fourth engex of the night and had just signaled Swerve for a fifth when Skids jumped up on top of the bar with a megaphone and clicked it on with an armor-rattling shriek of feedback.

“All right, slaggers, you know what time it is!” he shouted, and Ratchet dampened his audials in anticipation of what he knew was coming. “ _Who wants to play--”_

_“TRUTH! OR! DRINK!”_

Ratchet didn’t shout it out with the rest of the overcharged mecha filling Swerve’s bar, but he was one of very few who didn’t, and at least his groan of dismay was hidden in the cacophony. In truth, he’d really been hoping to get blitzed in relative peace tonight--not that _peace,_ relative or otherwise, was often available on this crazy ship. At least his patented Hatchet Scowl had run off anyone who’d dared to intrude on his corner of the bar so far tonight. 

But no scowl in the universe could stop this stupid game. _Oh well,_ he thought as he tossed back the last of his drink with one hand and accepted the new one from Swerve with the other, _maybe it’ll be entertaining enough to distract me for a while. And if not, there’s always a chance that whatever’s in the Coward’s Brew tonight will blank my processor enough to recharge for once._ Not that he’d ever particularly cared about honestly answering the stupid questions they asked, but frag knew regular engex wasn’t shutting down his brain module anymore, and if he jolted online in the middle of the night one more time from another memory dump about Luna One he might actually give in and acknowledge the concerned looks Rung had been sending his way lately--

Skids waved his hands until the crowd at least lowered their cheers from _deafening_ to merely _annoying_ and Ratchet was only too willing to embrace the distraction from that train of thought. “Tonight’s question is--” Skids yelled, then paused for effect, letting the crew shout suggestions and demands for a few moments until Whirl actually jumped up on a table and had to be pulled down by Cyclonus and Chromedome before finally continuing. _“STORYTIME, PITFRAGGERS!_ Who was your very first frag?”

Cheers and raucous laughter greeted that, and only ages spent perfecting the art of never being visibly caught off-guard kept Ratchet from choking on his first sip of his new drink. 

Long practice in perfecting the art of drinking helped him turn that sip into a determined chug that took down the entire thing in one go, even though no amount of practice in faking sobriety could fully hide the impact that the sudden rush of engex had taken on his equilibrium when he stood up.

Yeah, not even a blackout from the Coward’s Brew was worth poking at _this_ particular dent.

Several of the braver--or drunker--mecha jeered at Ratchet as he pushed his way to the door, but he’d anticipated that. He flipped a rude gesture at the room in general and didn’t let them impede his progress. “Yeah, yeah, get smelted,” he growled at the hecklers. “You fraggers want me still overcharged when you come stumbling into the medbay later? I could weld your faces to your afts or I could go sleep it off first, your choice.” 

The nearest group laughed but parted to let him through. Huffer bowed with exaggerated politeness as the medic passed, nearly toppling over before Powerglide grabbed his arm and hauled him back upright. “I rest my case,” Ratchet said dryly, and then he was in the hall and the door was closing behind him.

Only then did he see that he wasn’t the only mech who’d decided to leave.

Drift slipped out just ahead of him and vented deeply as the door shut and the noise of the bar vanished. He straightened his shoulders and deliberately resettled his armor before glancing back and catching sight of Ratchet. The instant of hesitation before he smiled and inclined his helm would’ve probably been unnoticeable to anyone else. 

Ratchet refused to consider what it meant that he’d noticed it instantly. 

“Evening, Ratch,” Drift said, falling into step beside him as they headed down the corridor toward the lift. “Didn’t see you in there.”

Ratchet shrugged. “Wasn’t really in there to be seen,” he said, because he couldn’t say the same to Drift. He’d definitely seen the swordsmech in there as Drift had laughed at whatever story Rodimus was telling at the big central table, unfairly gorgeous in the low light even if his smiles were always carefully controlled to avoid exposing the fangs that Ratchet _knew_ were still there. It had been as good a diversion as any, watching Drift talk and laugh, waiting to see if he’d ever forget himself enough to let Ratchet catch a glimpse.

He still hadn’t by the time Skids had announced the Question of the Night.

But these weren’t the right kind of thoughts to be having while Drift was standing right beside him and glancing up at him, clearly waiting for some elaboration on Ratchet’s vague answer. He had no intention of giving him that elaboration and said the first thing that popped into his processor instead. “Didn’t want to stick around and play? I bet our illustrious captain has a game-winning story.”

Drift punched the button for the lift and shrugged, and something about the movement wasn’t quite as fluid as Ratchet was used to seeing from him. On any other mech it would’ve looked liquid, but on Drift? No, there was tension there--tension expertly hidden, but Ratchet knew his mannerisms too well by now to miss it… and that was another thing he wasn’t going to think about too closely. “I’ve already heard Roddy’s, and I guarantee it’s not whatever he’ll be telling in there tonight,” he said, leading Ratchet into the lift and punching the button for the officers’ level. “And mine isn’t one I particularly care to throw out for public consumption.”

Ratchet sucked in a vent before he could stop himself. _The Dead End--fraggit, how could I forget that?_

_Because I’ve stopped seeing a broken leaker or a buymech when I look at him, that’s how._

Desperate for a distraction yet again, Ratchet’s vocalizer ran without his processor getting in on the action once more. “At least you _have_ a story to tell,” he heard himself say in a tone far too bitter to be played off as anything else.

The lift stopped and the doors slid open, but Ratchet just stood there, momentarily too horrified at what he’d just admitted to walk out. Drift was probably staring at him but he didn’t dare glance over to see what his face showed. It was only when the doors dinged and started to close again that Ratchet found his voice, even if all he could manage was a soft and sparkfelt, _“Frag.”_

“Apparently not,” Drift replied in a perfect deadpan, and Ratchet’s frame unlocked at last as his helm whipped around fast enough to send his gyros spinning for a second. The speedster was smiling as he reached out to stop the doors--looking sideways up at Ratchet and smiling wryly. To Ratchet’s continuing shock, there was nothing mocking in the expression. It was the smile of a mech inviting a friend to share the joke, not the grin of someone who was about to take what he’d learned and turn it into a weapon. When Ratchet just stared at him, mouth open, Drift took his arm in a gentle grip and urged him forward. “Come on, let’s free up the lift before Magnus writes us up for violating safety regulations.”

Ratchet allowed himself to be ushered down the corridor, unable to think of how else to react. Chugging that last drink had been a mistake--that was the only explanation he could think of for spilling that particular secret. Yeah, it had to be the engex. Otherwise he’d have to accept that the reminder that he knew things about Drift that the swordsmech would certainly rather forget had made him want to even the score and that was just stupid. 

And by now Drift had escorted him all the way to his door and he’d been silent much too long to pass as anything remotely resembling casual. “Drift, I…” Ratchet began, only to realize he didn’t really know how to finish the sentence. Half a second’s thought was all he needed to know that he didn’t need to ask Drift not to tell anyone--flaky and annoying he might be, but Drift was trustworthy. And he didn’t need to apologize for the awkward moment, because Drift seemed completely unfazed. _Ratchet_ was the one who was flustered. 

Finally he reached out and entered his access code. “I suppose now you’re gonna ask about that,” he grumbled, taking refuge in grouchiness as the last defense it so often was.

Drift shrugged, but he followed Ratchet inside. Clearly he’d been around Ratchet long enough to realize that the lack of a door slamming in his faceplates was as good of an invitation as he could hope for. “Nope.”

That had Ratchet off-balance all over again. _Ha, like I’ve caught my balance_ once _since I said that!_ “No?”

Drift smiled at him again and spread his hands. “I’m not in the business of interrogating people for their secrets, Ratch. You’ll want Soundwave or Jazz for that. But if you _want_ to tell someone how you got to this age while also getting a reputation like _the Party Ambulance,_ I’m happy to listen, and it’ll never leave this room.” 

Ratchet scowled and was about to shoot _that_ idea down with every bit of ammunition in his verbal arsenal, but then he made the mistake of meeting Drift’s optics.

There was absolutely no mockery there, no pity, and honestly, he’d have been shocked if there was. If any mech in the universe wouldn’t laugh at him for reaching such an advanced age with his seals intact, it was Drift.

And talking was certainly better than avoiding his berth and the recurrent nightmares of Luna One, of being stripped of his frame and left utterly defenseless, of being pinned to a wall and tortured by someone he’d once considered a friend--

“Fine,” Ratchet said before he could talk himself out of it. He turned his back on Drift and walked over to fall down onto his couch with more force than was strictly necessary. “I was gonna say I’m not drunk enough for that but what the hell, I guess I am… as long as you promise to never mention that _fragging_ nickname ever again.” 

“Done,” Drift agreed. A moment later he sat at the other end of the couch with far more grace than Ratchet’s sprawl, but then again, he’d had nothing but midgrade at Swerve’s. “Sorry. Didn’t know you didn’t like it.”

“You couldn’t have known. I’ve certainly spent enough years pretending I thought it was hilarious,” Ratchet said, waving that away. He rubbed a hand over his face, trying to figure out where to start.

Drift helped with that after a moment. “There’s no shame in being asexual, you know that, right? Some mecha are just sparked that way and it’s _fine.”_

“Of course I know that,” Ratchet said, just managing to moderate his tone from _scathing_ to merely _snappish._ “Problem is, I’m not.”

And even though Drift didn’t ask the obvious question, now Ratchet had found out where to start, right there.

“My spark ignited way back at the start of Nominus’ Primacy, back before the Vaporex hot spot cooled. My _Primus-granted function,”_ a scathing tone complete with air quotes, “was obvious the first time they looked at my hands, so the Council shipped me straight off to Iacon for training at the Academy as soon as I cooled,” he said, and all of this sounded like a complete change of subject, but Drift didn’t so much as twitch. _Fragging ninja has a better poker face than half the medics I ever knew,_ Ratchet thought with amusement. 

“But while I was forged with the right frame mods for medicine, what everyone seems to forget is that my frametype gave me nothing more than that. It certainly didn’t make me love it, but the more I learned, the more I hungered to know,” he said, and now he was looking past Drift, remembering it for the first time in far too long. All the hours spent in the library, and then in the archives; how he could practically feel his processor absorbing it all, the new data pathways forming… how many times he’d forgotten to fuel or recharge because he’d started researching an assignment and ended up jumping from anatomy to malfunction to disease to cure to research to theory and forgot that the world outside existed until his teachers sent someone to find him and pour a cube down his intake and send him to berth.

Drift rested an elbow on the back of the sofa, bringing Ratchet out of his reverie and reminding him of all the times Drift had pulled him out of the medbay and made him refuel and go recharge. _Some things never change,_ he thought, smiling faintly, before remembering that he was telling a story here.

“Anyway,” he said lamely, trying to cover the fact that he’d been remembering those ancient med school days and had forgotten Drift was there, “I got a bit of a reputation in those early years, and not a complimentary one. It wasn’t normal for a newspark to spend so much time isolated, studying. I didn’t pay much attention to what anyone thought of me at first, but then I realized that everyone I’d started training with had long since split off into friend groups, doing things I wasn’t included in, and I figured out exactly how the others saw me. And, well, it seems pretty stupid now, but at the time being shunned and mocked or having mean pranks played on me felt pretty bad.”

“You were very young,” Drift said, a hint of his field unfurling between them, offering without pushing. Ratchet only hesitated a moment before allowing his own field to brush Drift’s in a surface-level contact. Drift’s showed understanding and a hint of anger at those long-ago slights. “And other mecha can be cruel. I’m sorry you had to deal with that.”

Talk about misplaced sympathy. Ratchet’s life had been so pampered compared to Drift’s, so incredibly privileged, that he found himself pressing an apology into his field before he could stop it. “It hardly counted as cruel, but it _was_ enough for me to want a different reputation,” he replied, trying to move past the awkward moment. “I didn’t stop hungering for knowledge, but I made myself spend time socially with the others. It was pretty stilted at first, but eventually I found myself with friends for the first time in my life.

“And that’s when I realized that I was the only mech I knew who was still sealed.”

He remembered the moment vividly. He’d been at a party with his little group of friends, his second drink of the night in one hand (and he hardly remembered being such a lightweight, but back then he’d rarely had anything stronger than a flavored engex cooler), as his friends all laughingly told stories of their first time ‘facing.

They’d all been younger than Ratchet--some of them by quite a bit--but they all had a story.

And then they’d turned to Ratchet and he hadn’t known what to do.

“So I lied,” Ratchet said now, unsure how much of all of that he’d described aloud, but unwilling to look at Drift again to find out. “I’d spent most of my first few centuries reading everything I could get my hands on, and not all of the books I read were medical texts. I was certain I could spin a believable story of some mystery mech that I’d met at a club, who’d swept me off my feet and rocked my universe and…” He laughed a little, shaking his head with millennia-old embarrassment. “It probably wasn’t all that believable, but they bought it, and I remember actually thinking _well, that was easy._ Like the problem was completely solved now, never to be an issue again.”

“I’m gonna guess it wasn’t that easy,” Drift murmured.

“Your guess is entirely correct,” Ratchet said, pushing to his feet and going to his cabinet for another drink, more to have something to do with his hands than anything else. He grabbed a bottle at random, poured a shot, and downed it. “Time went on, I kept lying, the stories grew a life of their own. It's not like I never thought about it, you know? I just always had… something else to do. I _wanted_ to have relationships, I _wanted_ to, but I just…”

His voice trailed off. He shook his head and started to reach for the bottle again, but suddenly he remembered just who was on his couch. He stopped and considered before drawing two cubes of plain midgrade instead. 

“What I’d completely failed to consider,” he said, turning to face Drift again, “was that at some point, I’d want to _actually_ interface, and I’ve never been very good at admitting I was wrong.”

“No, really?”

Ratchet brought the fuel back to the couch and shoved one cube at a smirking Drift before sitting back down. “Smart-aft,” he growled, but he couldn’t put much heat in it. “I’d been dating this mech for a while and one night I finally let him talk me into his berth. At first it was going well, but just when I was gonna admit that it was my first time, he grinned and told me how much he’d been looking forward to this, _considering my reputation.”_ The air-quotes that usually got a smiling roll of the optics from Drift got no reaction at all now. “I asked what reputation, scared strutless because the _last_ thing I wanted was for everyone to start leaving slag in my rooms or shouting insults at me again, but he said, _No need to act coy, Ratchet, you’re learning all the right things from those mecha you pick up at clubs--I’ve been dying to experience the Party Ambulance for myself!”_ He mock-toasted Drift and smiled utterly without humor. 

Drift didn’t drink from his cube or return the smile. “And so given the choice between the two reputations, you chose that one.”

“You got it,” Ratchet said. He wished he’d grabbed the high-grade after all. “Anyway, I didn’t freeze, at least, and I managed to give my partner a tactile overload, but I didn’t dare try to go any further than that with him and have him find out just how much my little lie had grown. And the more time passed, the harder it got to tell _anyone_ the truth. After my graduation I finally decided to just quietly find someone to take care of the problem surgically, but I underestimated how far my stupid fragging reputation had spread outside of school--and I don’t mean the Party Ambulance one. There’s a problem with impressing your professors. They talk, and that talk ends up spreading. Sometimes it ends with a new graduate being elevated to Prime’s personal medic after only a few decades on the job. And not only do medics gossip like you wouldn’t believe, they’ll turn on a mech they’re jealous of like scraplets stripping a frame.”

“What about patient confidentiality?” Drift said, and Ratchet was surprised to feel real anger in his field now, not just the suggestion of it he’d felt earlier.

Ratchet just snorted and took another gulp of fuel. “Put it this way. How hard would the ‘Cons have turned on you if they had some humiliating slag on you? You think they’d have held off on that if it was _confidential_ slag?” Drift’s anger surged for a moment before he finally tamped down his field and nodded--clearly not liking it, but acknowledging the truth of Ratchet’s situation. It didn’t really make Ratchet feel much better, but he sat back with an ease he didn’t feel and spread his arms in a gesture that took in everything at once. 

“So, yeah. There’s the story. I didn’t dare tell a lover, and I sure as frag didn’t dare tell another medic, and Nominus kept me busy every waking moment even _before_ he snuffed it and I got named CMO. Then the Functionists started designating mecha as Disposables and refusing to allow us to give them even emergency treatment, so I opened my secret clinic in Rodion and spent every possible moment I could there when I wasn’t trying to run three hospitals or babysit Sentinel Prime, not to mention trying to keep Orion Pax from getting himself killed chasing after Megatron and his damn attempts to stir up revolution. When did I _ever_ have time to worry about something as stupid as my seals? And then the war started, and went on and on and _on,_ and now that’s it’s over…” He ran out of steam and sighed. _“That stupid fragging nickname survived it all!_ You spent four million years on the other side of the war and even _you_ knew it! What am I supposed to do with that hanging over me, just grab someone and say _hey, you wanna frag the oldest virgin in the known universe?”_

In contrast to how hard Ratchet was trying and failing to act unaffected, Drift’s poker face as solid as ever. He gripped his cube tight, not even a twitch to hint at any reaction to Ratchet’s story. After a moment, he spoke, but he didn’t look up at Ratchet when he did so. “And you never surgically removed your own seals because--?”

Ratchet winced at the little stab that the question provoked, but he only shrugged. He’d admitted to everything else. He might as well admit to all of it. “We live a long time, Drift--or we’re meant to, at least. We don’t get a lot of firsts. I didn’t want to miss out on one of mine, even if every year that passed made it less and less likely. I always thought _well, I'll have time later,_ and then _later_ came and I realized I'd left it too late. But even so… I just didn’t want to give up on it ever happening for real.” He hadn't wanted to give up on romance, on someone caring enough to take the time to seduce him into their berth and truly rock his universe just like that fantasy mech he'd imagined so many long centuries ago. He gave a little laugh that held no humor at all. “Pretty stupid at my age, right?”

Drift only shook his head, still staring hard into his fuel. Ratchet finished his and dispersed the cube--even the extra energy from midgrade would prolong his overcharge, but that wasn’t exactly a downside right now. In fact, the carefully hoarded bottle of Nightmare Fuel hidden behind the most boring medical texts on his bookshelf was calling to him with the promise of burying this entire humiliating conversation, but Drift was already seeing him much too overcharged to qualify as _tipsy._ Ratchet could wait until the speedster left before he got completely star-sabered.

Besides, Ratchet wasn’t entirely certain his runaway vocalizer wouldn’t spit out something completely stupid like asking if Drift would help him out with his little problem if he did.

“The answer to your question is _yes,_ by the way,” Drift said suddenly, and Ratchet had an instant’s _terror/elation_ where he wasn’t sure if he’d spoken that last thought aloud, but Drift kept speaking before he could wonder for more than a split second. “You _are_ supposed to find someone you trust and ask them.”

Ratchet had a brief moment of emotional whiplash as _terror/elation_ was replaced by a tangle of _relief/disappointment_ before he managed to get hold of himself. Pit, he hoped none of that had spilled out into the upper levels of his field where it still mingled with Drift’s! “I didn’t wait this long to be a pity-frag,” he said sharply. “And this ship is likely to be my last home, so who am I supposed to trust to keep their mouth shut about something like this? You know as well as I do _exactly_ how fast juicy rumors fly here--just think about Swerve, he couldn’t keep his damn mouth shut to _literally_ save his life. I'm sure Rewind would put it in his damn documentary, or the fragging _Lost Light Insider_ \--slag, your amica would probably announce it on ship-wide intercom!”

“Rodimus would never do that,” Drift said, but there was no heat to the denial. He finally looked up and met Ratchet’s optics. “And you already trusted someone to keep their mouth shut, Ratchet.”

Ratchet froze like a petrorabbit in the headlights for an instant. Drift’s words replayed in his processor, possibilities spooling out faster than he could delete the processor trees, until one explanation popped up and pushed the others to the background. _Drift is only making the point that there are mecha you could ask on this ship. This does not necessarily mean that Drift is volunteering himself for the task._

That hypothesis made sense.

Unfortunately, it was also disappointing as slag.

Ratchet stood up again and paced away from the couch, letting the distance separate their fields instead of rudely disengaging from Drift’s. The mech had listened to him whine without mocking him once. The least he could do was show some kind of manners, and he was tired of trying to control what emotions his own field betrayed. 

He was glad he’d done so when Drift kept speaking. “I hope you know that I don’t pity you, Ratchet. And I’m sure you’ve known for a long time that I’m attracted to you.”

Ratchet froze in place yet again, unable to even turn and look at Drift as the explanation he’d just decided on was knocked sideways in his mind--not to mention that he certainly had _not_ known anything of the sort. “You’re not seriously telling me you'll relieve me of my seals,” he said, because unless he’d somehow slipped into one of Brainstorm’s alternate dimensions, there was no way that could actually be happening, but his attempt at sarcasm came out decidedly strangled.

He heard Drift stand. “It's not my place to tell you anything, Ratch,” he said, and there was that whiplash again. Ratchet was either too drunk or not drunk enough to deal with all these abrupt reversals, but apparently there was one more in store for him, because Drift was still speaking.

“But if you wanted to trust me again, I _am_ inviting you to ask.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, y'all remember when I swore up and down that I was never gonna do songs for chapter titles again cuz it drove me so nuts when I did it in Chemicals?
> 
> ... yeah... well... about that...
> 
> https://genius.com/Onerepublic-secrets-lyrics
> 
> IT'S NOT MY FAULT, THE MUSE INSISTED! *falls over and weeps*


	2. Call Me When You're Sober

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, this got such an amazing response that I'm floored! Thank you to each and every one of you!

Ratchet’s knees went weak as those words replayed in his audials. _I_ am _inviting you to ask,_ Drift said, six words that stole the air from his vents and kicked off an avalanche of possibilities in his processor. Desires too long denied surged to the surface so abruptly that momentarily all he could do was flounder beneath the onslaught of thousands--no, _millions_ \--of years of secret fantasies, a lifetime's worth of lonely dreams of what it would be like to finally have a lover. The idea of living out even a few of those fantasies with Drift was nearly enough to bluescreen his processor.

But he only struggled for a moment. Ratchet wouldn’t have survived this long if he hadn’t learned how to dismiss distractions and force himself to focus on the here and now, and he wrenched his processor back to the present with all his might. Possible refusals queued in his mind, anything from sarcastic to furious, but in the end they were all discarded. Drift had always treated him far better than Ratchet deserved--not just protecting him in so many situations that he was starting to lose count, but also all the times he'd put up with Ratchet's acerbic personality and never held it against him. Even Drift’s frequent visits to the medbay to needle him into religious debates/arguments counted, because he was pretty sure Drift knew that Ratchet enjoyed those just as much as Drift did. That didn't even include the way he'd listened to all of this without making a single joke at his expense. No, Ratchet wouldn’t repay all of that with a rude dismissal.

Not to mention that Drift wasn’t pressuring Ratchet in the slightest. He hadn’t come across as pushy, he hadn’t acted anything like a mech who thought he was owed something just because he’d happened to be in the right place at the right time. No, he’d merely stated a fact--Ratchet had already confessed all of this to him, knowing that he’d take it to the Allspark, and if that wasn't trust, nothing was. All Drift was doing was pointing out that Ratchet was welcome to trust him with more, should he wish.

He closed his optics, venting shakily. Oh, did he ever _wish._ “You… you know the Party Ambulance reputation isn't real, right? I'm pretty sure you'd be disappointed,” he hedged, unable to force himself to outright refuse but too cowardly to actually accept.

Drift chuckled, his high-performance engine purring low, and the two sounds blended into something effortlessly, _unbearably_ sexy. “Oh, I highly doubt that.”

 _Primus._ He'd never been so tempted, but this was a terrible idea. Ratchet was certain of it.

Unfortunately he was also just a little bit too drunk to fully articulate _why_ , even to himself, and he stalled for time by blurting the first thing that came to his processor. “Aren't you on duty in the morning?”

He glanced over before he could stop himself and lost his breath all over again. Drift had left the couch and now he was much closer than Ratchet had thought, only an arm's length away as he leaned against the wall in a way that emphasized the width of his shoulders and the curve of his waist. Deliberate? Perhaps. Completely and utterly gorgeous?

_Definitely._

The thought of actually touching him--and especially of Drift returning the favor--was so incredibly arousing that Ratchet had to scramble to disable his fans to stop them from kicking on. And some of that almost certainly came through in his field because Drift's lips curved in a smile. “Don't worry about that, Ratch,” he said, affection warm in his optics, “the only thing you'll be doing in your berth tonight is recharging. It's late and you have duty in the morning too, and besides, something this special shouldn't be rushed. At the very least you should make sure you have the next day off to recover.”

Ratchet's processor damn near crashed all over again at the idea of Drift exhausting him so thoroughly in the berth that he'd need a slagging _recovery day,_ but the speedster was still speaking. “More importantly, you've had quite a lot of engex tonight,” Drift added. “You should be completely sober before you make a decision like this, and you’re in no shape to consent to anything right now. I'd never take advantage of you.”

It was the engex. It had to be the engex, because nothing else explained what slipped out of Ratchet's vocalizer next. "I think I'd like it if you took advantage,” he heard himself say, and his spark kicked hard when Drift's optics sharpened and anything casual about his pose evaporated. _A predator sighting his prey,_ Ratchet thought, a shiver working down his spinal strut.

He didn't get a chance to try to figure out how to take back his words--or if he even wanted to--before Drift moved. One dark hand rose, slowly enough for Ratchet to easily avoid it if he chose, and slipped around to cup the nape of Ratchet's neck. The warmth of his palm against that vulnerable plating sent another shiver of anticipation through his frame that he couldn't fight.

But Drift didn't draw him closer. “You are very drunk, Ratchet,” Drift murmured, his field pressing a hint of gentle refusal as he shook his head, and Ratchet’s spark sank in all too familiar disappointment.

He should've known better than to get his hopes up, even for a moment. “And you weren't serious,” he growled, all the old _humiliation/bitterness_ boiling up to scald his lines and _slag_ tomorrow's duty shift, he was gonna _empty that fragging bottle_ of Nightmare Fuel tonight. Maybe that would be enough to drown the memory of finally getting up the nerve to make a pass at Drift and yet again not being good enough--of confessing all of this for the first time in his life and still being rejected. He knocked Drift’s hand aside and pushed past him, not paying any attention to where he was going, just needing _space._

Drift frowned and reached out to stop him, his field suddenly flooding with _concern/worry._ “No, I didn't mean--” he started, but Ratchet refused to let him finish.

“I don’t need your fragging _pity!”_ he shouted, shoving Drift’s hand away again and following up this time with a punch to his shoulder to make him slagging _move_ . The way Drift shifted just enough for his fist to glance harmlessly off his curved _(sleek, graceful, beautiful)_ shoulder panel only made Ratchet angrier--there was no chance he’d ever land a punch on the speedster unless Drift deliberately allowed it, and the easy dodge only served to underscore just how far out of his league Drift was. _That’s probably the only way I’ll ever touch him outside of the medbay,_ he thought, knowing his field flared bright with _pain_ and _humiliation_ that he couldn't hide. Stung to the spark and unable to physically retaliate, he struck back the only way he could. “I hope you enjoyed yourself, congratulations, you got me to admit slag no one else ever managed. Cruel joke even for a ‘Con but you were always one of the greats, weren’t you? So now that you’ve had your big laugh you can _get the frag_ _out of my hab--”_

This time Drift didn’t just put out an arm to block his retreat. The swordsmech grabbed Ratchet’s shoulders and shoved him right back against the wall in a move so fast that Ratchet had no chance to dodge it. The impact of his shoulders hitting the wall wasn’t hard enough to actually hurt--Drift remained in perfect control of his every movement while Ratchet felt like he was about to jitter right out of his frame--but the unexpectedness of it was still enough to cut off Ratchet’s voice in mid-rant. 

“Ratchet, _you are drunk,”_ Drift snapped into the abrupt silence, his fingers digging into Ratchet’s shoulders. More than that, though, it was the rough edge to his voice--that _Deadlock_ edge--that let Ratchet know that he was perhaps not as perfectly in control as he seemed. “You really want to lose your seals with me? Then you fragging tell me that when you’re _sober_ and I will be absolutely thrilled to ‘face you through the damn berth in every way you can possibly imagine, but we are _not_ going to do a damn thing when you're drunk and reckless and not in control of yourself!”

Ratchet stared at him, his head spinning with engex and emotion and Drift’s nearness and the echoes of that offer ringing in his audials. _Primus!_ “You’re… you're really not joking? You’d actually want to?” he whispered, despising how the question stripped away his defenses again, but damn it all, he _needed_ to know. 

Drift released his shoulders to cup his face instead. The gentleness of his hands held Ratchet captive even more effectively than the tight grip on his shoulders had. "You have no idea how much," he said softly. _"No idea."_

And apparently Ratchet wasn't finished making a damn fool of himself tonight because he leaned forward until his lips were a breath away from Drift's and whispered, "Prove it."

And kissed him.

For an endless frozen moment, Drift didn’t move. Ratchet’s spark throbbed in its crystal, every bit of his attention hyperfocused on the wonderful feel of Drift’s lips against his and oh, this had to be one of the stupidest things he’d ever done, but he’d never gotten up the bearings to admit any of this before. He'd never come so close to really asking anyone to interface with him and he didn’t know if he could ever get this close again. _Reckless,_ Drift had called him, and he was one hundred percent correct in that, but Ratchet couldn’t seem to stop himself.

He didn't _want_ to stop himself.

Drift’s engine surged and for the barest moment, his lips softened beneath Ratchet’s, yielding to the kiss. Emboldened, Ratchet dared try to deepen the kiss, nipping at Drift’s lower lip. The swordsmech shuddered and leaned closer, field flaring _heat/frustration,_ but then he wrenched his lips from Ratchet’s and pressed their forehelms together instead. When Ratchet tried to change the angle so he could kiss him again, Drift didn't allow it.

“Engage your FIM chip,” he demanded, his Crystal City accent shaded with something rougher--more hints of Deadlock, and frag, he really should not find that as sexy as he did. “Do it, Ratchet, do it _now.”_

Caught off-guard by the command, Ratchet obeyed on reflex alone. Sobriety, ice-cold and deeply unwelcome, abruptly cleared the blissful haze and disregard of consequences from his processor, and Ratchet shuddered as the feedback of all that excess energy washed over him.

… oh slag him in the smelter, he’d really _just_ _kissed Drift,_ hadn’t he?

Drift watched his optics as Ratchet’s FIM chip wrestled the overabundance of fuel into submission. He seemed to see the exact moment that Ratchet plummeted to full sobriety because that was when he spoke again. “Now,” he said, still in that same rough voice, “you tell me if _you_ just kissed me or if the engex did. You take a vent and _think_ and then tell me if you want me to walk out of here and forget this entire night ever happened or if you want something else, because dammit, Ratchet, there’s only so much temptation a mech can resist and _you are pushing it.”_

Ratchet stared at him, the reality of the situation falling on him like a cityformer, but the embarrassment of everything he'd said and done had no chance of taking hold against the rush of sensation electrifying every wire and line in his frame. Drift’s hands on his faceplates, his frame close enough for Ratchet to feel the heat of his exvents on his plating, the growl of that powerful engine like a mechanimal straining at its leash... it all combined into something far more intoxicating than anything Swerve's had ever had to offer. Add in the sizzle of Drift's field hot and _wanting_ where it meshed with his own and top it all off with the lingering memory of Drift’s lips on his, soft and warm and completely and utterly _thrilling_ and yeah, this decision suddenly wasn’t difficult to make at all.

This time when Ratchet kissed him, Drift didn't pull away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... okay, so the lyrics for this one don't match the chapter at all, but I'm using the title anyway. Sue me.
> 
> Also apparently consistent chapter lengths are things that happen to other people. *shrugs helplessly*


	3. Fire Meet Gasoline

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for your patience, everyone! We got my son moved out for college and I cried a lot and then I wrote Dratchets to make myself feel better. <3

Ratchet wasn’t a stupid mech. He might not have been the most in-touch with his emotions as other mechs, but that didn’t mean he was completely clueless.

He was well aware of _exactly_ how fragging dangerous this was.

He just couldn’t bring himself to care right now.

Drift shivered as Ratchet kissed him again, a barely-there reaction that was still more than enough to kick Ratchet’s spark into a faster spin. Oh, it had been so long since he’d allowed himself even this much, too afraid of the fallout if his web of lies came crashing down on him to get close to anyone. He hadn’t dared to try even in the early years of the war, when there had still been Neutral cities and the possibility of getting leave to visit them, places like dark nightclubs and cheap hotels where mechs from both factions could find an anonymous lover and not care about what badge they might be wearing in the morning. But Ratchet had never had the luxury of that kind of anonymity. Confidant and personal medic to the Prime, he’d been a high-value target since the first shots were fired. His face was one that was taught to all soldiers on both sides. It had been… centuries, frag, _millenia_ even, so damn long since Ratchet had last risked anything remotely like this.

So desperately, achingly long since he’d been this close to another mech that even the act of curling his hands around Drift’s shoulders felt incredibly daring, and the feel of Drift’s lips against his seemed like an intoxicating, forbidden indulgence.

Drift didn’t move his hands from where they still cradled his face and Ratchet dearly wished he would. _Hungered_ for it. “Drift,” he whispered against his lips without even trying to hide the yearning in his voice, slipping his hands beneath the swooping fenders of Drift’s shoulders, fingers searching out the sensitive, rarely-touched components to caress and hoping that the speedster would take the hint and return the favor without Ratchet having to actually say it.

Drift shivered again, and Ratchet became aware that it wasn’t only his own fans that were blowing hot. “Ratchet, what are you doing?” 

_Damn._ It wasn’t going to be that easy, even though he felt the desire in Drift’s field despite his efforts to hide it, not even when his fingertips brushed a spot that made Drift’s engine surge. He tried one last time. “Can’t you guess?”

“Not gonna guess about this,” Drift said, but his words cut out in a burst of static when Ratchet bit his lower lip. His hands did finally move then, but only to slap against the wall on either side of Ratchet’s helm, giving him the leverage to resist when Ratchet tried to pull him closer. _“Ratchet,”_ he growled, an edge in his voice that warned the medic not to evade again, and _frag him broken_ but that dangerous growl was rapidly becoming one of Ratchet’s favorite things. 

Ratchet thought about ignoring that warning, but he was afraid that Drift would leave entirely if he did. Hints, even ones as blatant as these, would get him nothing. If he wanted anything more than this, he was going to have to ask for it--a terrifying prospect that damn near locked his vocalizer entirely.

But only for an instant. Ratchet had never backed down from a challenge in his life, and he wasn’t about to start now. He drew back just enough to meet Drift’s optics directly. “You told me that you wanted me,” he said, refusing to allow his voice to give away the nervousness and vulnerability he felt. “I want you to kiss me like that’s true.”

Drift exvented in a rush and closed his optics briefly, his lips moving for a moment, mouthing silent words Ratchet didn’t catch entirely but might’ve been something like _Primus help me._ He hoped it was--he wanted Drift to be as tempted as he was. It would be awful to be the only one wrestling with this much desire.

“You gonna hate me tomorrow if I do?” Drift asked, and now the smooth Crystal City accent was almost completely buried beneath the rougher tones that sent such a thrill down Ratchet’s spine.

“I’ll hate you tonight if you don’t,” Ratchet shot back, because that definitely hadn’t been a _no_ and it sounded like it was damn close to becoming a _yes._

Drift finally looked at him again, optics scanning his face as if searching for the slightest indecision. There wasn’t any there for him to find. “Just that,” Drift finally whispered, and Ratchet wasn’t sure which one of them he was reminding. “Just kissing. That’s all.”

Ratchet knew that his field control wasn’t nearly strong enough right now to hide the surge of _triumph/eagerness/_ ** _yes_ ** from Drift, but it didn’t matter because in the next moment Drift had one arm around his waist and the other hand on the back of his neck, pulling him into a kiss that was nothing like the soft, hesitant ones Ratchet had given him. 

And when he took control, Drift kissed like a _demon._

Ratchet moaned, clutching Drift’s shoulders hard to keep his balance. Drift’s glossa swept over his lips and past them, licking into Ratchet’s mouth and mapping every inch, engine snarling at the sound of Ratchet’s moan, sharp teeth nipping at his lips, field unleashed and pouring _heat_ and _lust_ and _determination_ into Ratchet’s, and everything together hit Ratchet like throwing gasoline on a fire.

Drift didn’t just kiss like he wanted Ratchet. He kissed like a mech staking a claim, and Ratchet wanted nothing more than to surrender utterly.

His arm tightened around Ratchet’s waist and pulled their frames together so that the roar of his powerful speedster engine vibrated through Ratchet’s entire frame. Ratchet moaned again, drowning willingly in kiss after glorious kiss, giving Drift everything he asked for until nothing else mattered, nothing existed but this.

He wanted to give him more, give him _everything._ “You,” he gasped when Drift broke away and pulled Ratchet’s helm back to bare his throat to his mouth, kissing and nipping and suckling over the sensitive, vulnerable components. “You, I want it to be you, oh Drift _please--”_

Drift’s hold on him tightened and his engine _roared_ as he bit Ratchet’s throat, sending a visceral thrill straight down to join the molten desire already pooling hot and insistent between his thighs. And then his mouth was back on Ratchet’s, twice as hot as before.

Ratchet fell back against the wall and Drift followed, pressing close, and oh it was such a relief to _stop thinking_ and just feel. He didn’t fight it, finally letting his hands move from Drift’s shoulders to explore his gorgeous frame, no thought in his mind except the desire to find every place that made Drift moan or growl or shudder, to return some of the incredible pleasure he was giving Ratchet as his own hands wandered over Ratchet’s plating.

Drift's hands slid down to Ratchet's aft and squeezed, pulling their hips together as he kissed over to Ratchet’s audial, lips brushing the metal as he murmured low and rough against it. “Then come to my hab tomorrow and I’ll make it everything you dreamed of, lay you out on my berth and spend the entire night worshiping your frame, kiss you everywhere, find everything that gets you hot, makes you beg,” and Ratchet was glad of the wall at his back and Drift’s strong frame at his front because he couldn’t seem to remember how his knees worked. All he could do was moan and hold on tight and _drown_ in the promise of everything he’d denied himself for far, far too long as their engines surged together and his fans neared redline.

But the tiny _click_ of his panel lock was still loud enough to freeze them both.

Ratchet’s optics snapped open in shock--he had _never_ lost control of his panel before, not _once_ in his entire life! But that shock was instantly swamped with _fear/dread_ because he couldn’t stop the secondary cover over his spike from spiraling open too, exposing the seal just beneath it. _No,_ it wasn’t supposed to happen like this! Not now, not when he’d finally found a lover who'd promised to take his seals gently, he wanted _that,_ not to have his first time be his spike ripping through his unprepared seal but he couldn’t stop it and Ratchet couldn’t hold back a whimper as he cringed because _oh frag_ _this was going to **hurt--**_

It took a moment before Ratchet realized that the pain he’d expected didn’t come. He forced his optics open and found Drift staring down at him, optics wide with an echo of the shock Ratchet felt. But it wasn’t until a red OBSTRUCTION warning flashed in his HUD that Ratchet realized exactly what he _was_ feeling between his thighs.

Pressure against his groin, a firm, steady pressure that blocked his spike housing and prevented his spike from pressurizing.

_Drift’s hand._

His spike tried to initialize again, pressurizing just enough to push against Drift’s hand, and Ratchet almost choked at the sensation. He’d had tactile overloads, and he could bring himself off by playing with the sensitivity of his hands, but he’d never felt anything like the immediacy and urgency of the flash of _pleasure/frustration_ that surged up from that one point of contact between the tip of his still-hidden spike and the heel of Drift’s hand.

The red warning flashed again but this time he barely noticed because his processor damn near blue-screened at that realization.

 _His spike. Drift’s hand._ The only thing separating them was a thin layer of silicone.

“Oh frag,” Ratchet moaned, arousal swamping him again and making his knees shake. “Oh no, oh frag, I didn’t, didn’t mean to, oh frag _Drift--”_

Drift shuddered against him but apart from wrapping his free arm around Ratchet again to help support him, he didn’t move. “Can you close it?” 

Ratchet tried to laugh, but it came out strangled and staticky. His spike kept trying to emerge from its sheath and pushing against Drift’s hand before retracting again, and every time it happened, a jolt of pleasure washed through him and scrambled every thought in his processor. Even _finding_ the command string to close the inner iris was damn near impossible. “Little distracted,” he gasped, then groaned as his spike pushed against Drift’s palm again. 

“Try,” Drift said urgently, as though that wasn’t exactly what Ratchet was already _trying to do._ “We’ll stop so you can cool off and you can close it and we’ll try again later, I know ways to do it that won’t hurt--”

His voice cut off when Ratchet’s spike tried to emerge yet again, more insistently this time. It seemed that just sensing the blockage wasn’t enough to trigger the failsafe anymore--now his spike was attempting to _push it out of the way_ and the steady pressure of the hypersensitive tip against Drift’s hand for seconds at a time before it relented was either heaven or torture, he couldn’t decide which. Ratchet moaned until his vocalizer glitched with it. “Oh _fragging pit_ Drift no complaints but having your hand right _there_ isn’t exactly helping anything cool off!”

“Primus help me,” Drift groaned, resting his forehelm against Ratchet’s and venting almost as fast as he was. They stayed frozen like that for what felt like an eternity, Ratchet gasping and moaning and shuddering every time his spike pushed against Drift’s hand.

And to make things worse, between attempts he became increasingly aware of how carefully Drift had positioned his fingers so that they framed his valve without quite touching it, and now his entire array was demanding _more._ Between the clenching of calipers inside his valve and the throbbing urgency of his spike, neither of which he had _ever_ felt before, Ratchet could hardly focus enough to stay standing, much less to initiate a command string. 

“Can’t,” he finally gasped, giving in to the inevitable. He hadn’t wanted to lose his spike seal like this but at least he was so aroused that hopefully the pain wouldn’t stand a chance against it. “S-sorry, Drift, I can’t do it.”

Drift started to speak but stopped himself. Ratchet threw back his helm and moaned brokenly as his spike tried to pressurize again several times in quick succession, sending his arousal skyrocketing. When the red error message flashed again and the erotic torment ceased--for the moment, anyway--Ratchet slumped against the wall, gasping for air. 

Drift finally spoke. “Then you need to overload.”

Ratchet would’ve laughed if his vocalizer wasn’t so swamped with static. The worst thing about these new sensations was the absolute certainty that he would need more than this to overload. As incredible as the pressure of his spike against Drift’s hand felt, it would never be enough to get him there. “Won’t work,” he groaned, clinging to Drift’s shoulders with all the strength he could muster, knowing that the instant he staggered or fell and Drift’s hand moved, his spike would rip through the seal. “Too much to calm down… not enough to get off,” he explained through gritted teeth as another attempt seared his circuits with the thrilling _pleasure/pain_ of denial.

Then to his utter shock, Drift leaned in and nuzzled his audial again. “Guess I’ll just have to give you a sneak preview, then, won’t I?” he purred against the metal, following his words with a swipe of his glossa.

And then his fingers, held so carefully away from his array until now, swept down and across his valve seal.

Ratchet cried out and his knees very nearly buckled, but Drift hid considerable strength in his deceptively lithe frame and he all but held Ratchet up until he could get control of his legs again. “Is that a yes?” Drift murmured in his audial, fingers still just a teasing presence on his seal.

 _“Yes!”_ Desperate as he was, Ratchet couldn’t spare a single damn to give about how fast he nearly shouted his answer. 

Mercifully, Drift didn’t tease. His fingertips swept inward again, sliding across the flexible seal until they located his anterior node. “Lock your knees,” he ordered, and Ratchet had to wait for another round of attempts from his spike to pass before he was able to straighten his trembling legs and lock the actuators. 

“D-done,” he gasped, and then moaned loud and long as Drift kissed him again. Oh, he had only kissed Drift for the first time tonight but already he was addicted to the demanding, possessive way he kissed, the wicked thrill of brushing against a fang as their glossas tangled and dueled, the little nips Drift gave his lips and how he growled if Ratchet returned the favor…

… and then Ratchet threw his helm back, kissing utterly forgotten as he shouted with pleasure when Drift’s fingers finally stopped their explorations and rubbed directly over his anterior node. _“Drift, Drift, ahh!”_

Drift’s engine roared. “Oh yeah, say my name like that,” he purred, nibbling along Ratchet’s jaw now. “Just like that, Ratch, and now _moan_ for me,” and the demand came simultaneously with another attempt from his spike, but instead of merely blocking, this time Drift rocked the palm of his hand over the seal, allowing his spike to actually tent the silicone and then massaging the tip as Drift pressed it inexorably back down.

Ratchet gave him all the moans he wanted, couldn’t have been quiet if his life depended on it. His hips moved completely outside of his control now, rocking in time to the pace of Drift’s fingers on his node. His valve was primed and ready, lubricant collecting behind the seal, and the slickness allowed Drift’s fingers to slide the silicone back and forth, back and forth over his node. Ratchet struggled to open his optics, managed to catch a glimpse of Drift watching him avidly, optics blazing, lips parted, hunger painted over every feature, before it was too much and Ratchet’s optics closed again. 

Drift kissed him again, swallowing Ratchet’s increasingly desperate cries and ending with a bite that sent tingles through his entire frame. “Primus, you’re so fragging hot like this, I could damn near overload just watching you,” he groaned, fingers _circling, flicking, rubbing_ on his node, palm _pressing, massaging, pressing_ over his spike. “Can’t wait to see you, Ratch, oh I bet you’re gorgeous under those seals, and I’m gonna be the first one to see… can’t wait to get my mouth on you, can’t wait to taste your overloads, gonna swallow you down while you scream my name…” 

Ratchet couldn’t focus, couldn’t think. Between the overwhelming pleasure between his thighs and Drift’s rough, erotic words, his processor had ground to a halt and he didn’t care because who needed a processor when ecstasy like this hovered just out of reach? He was vaguely aware that he was chanting Drift’s name, moaning and crying out; knew Drift was still speaking, purring those words that poured liquid heat through his lines; felt himself shaking hard enough to rattle his armor against the wall as he yearned toward the peak.

And then he was there, charge cresting and crackling over his armor as he overloaded harder than he ever had in his life. Ratchet shouted Drift’s name to the ceiling again and again and again until Drift kissed him hard, fingers and palm still working, drawing out the pleasure until Ratchet thought he might die from it. He’d overloaded before, yes, but it was _never_ like this, tactile and hand-play had _nothing_ on this.

When it passed, Ratchet found himself clinging breathlessly to Drift, fans aching from spinning so hard, Drift’s lips still on his. He kissed the speedster back the best he could manage for as long as he could before having to break away to pant for air, his overheated frame desperate to cool down in every way possible. Drift kissed down his neck, across his collar fairing, back up to his audial, every press of his mouth sending shivery aftershocks through his systems. “Better now?” Drift whispered in his audial, his field smug as the pit.

Ratchet finally remembered how to activate his secondary spike cover and he shuddered with relief as it obeyed the command to close this time. Drift slowly released the pressure over his spike housing as it closed and Ratchet bit back a protest when he removed his hand. “Frag me,” Ratchet groaned, his entire frame feeling loose and blissful and weak in a way he’d never before experienced.

“Glad to,” Drift replied, leaning back and grinning at Ratchet and oh yeah, that expression was every bit as smug as his field. And now Ratchet had learned that Drift could not only kiss his processor into stasis, he also looked damn sexy when he was smug. “Any time you like.”

Ratchet laughed breathlessly. “Well, I suppose you did pass your audition well enough,” he said, but he couldn’t hide the static in his voice well enough to deliver the teasing line in the dry tone it really deserved.

Drift grinned anyway, and this time he didn’t bother hiding his fangs. Ratchet’s spark gave a kick at the sight. “Oh, so I did just _well enough,_ hmm?” he said, and moved a step back. Ratchet staggered as he unlocked his frozen actuators and Drift’s smirk grew. “Guess you’ll have no trouble walking to your berth by yourself, then.”

Ratchet snorted and pushed himself fully upright with one hand on the wall. Then he reached out with the other, grabbing the swordsmech and dragging him back in and straight into a kiss, knowing that Drift could’ve easily evaded his reach if he’d wanted to. This kiss was different from the others, longer, slower, as though they had all the time in the world. “As though you don’t want to go to my berth with me,” Ratchet whispered against Drift’s mouth, nibbling at his bottom lip.

Drift groaned and kissed Ratchet again, a lot hotter but much shorter than Ratchet would’ve preferred. “The only thing you’re doing in your berth tonight is sleeping, remember?” he said when he pulled away. Ratchet bit back a moan at the rough sound of his voice, a reminder of the untamed edges hiding beneath the calm surface Drift showed the world. “Still on duty in the morning, and morning’s gonna be here faster than either of us would like. Not gonna rush this.” He nuzzled Ratchet’s jaw, then kissed his throat, just once. “Gonna take my time, savor every bit of you,” he whispered against Ratchet’s throat.

Ratchet bit his lip and cycled a slow vent to focus himself, but it was hard to do. Everything he’d fantasized about in a lover for so long was right here in front of him--beautiful, generous, dominant and a little bit dirty… slag, he couldn’t have dreamed up anyone more perfect. It was hard to believe that this was really going to happen, that he’d truly found a mech willing to relieve him of his seals after so many millennia of believing it would never happen.

That he’d found a mech he _wanted_ to give his seals to.

“Drift…” Ratchet found himself whispering, “you’re sure you want to do this?” He didn’t want to doubt it, but a lifetime of disappointments was hard to ignore. Drift lifted his head and Ratchet forced out the rest in a rush before he lost his nerve. “What I mean to say is, even if you change your mind later, thank you for… this. For tonight.” _For showing me what it could be like to really have a lover._ “For not pitying me, or making fun.”

Drift pressed his forehelm to Ratchet’s again. “Not going to change my mind,” he replied in the same soft tone Ratchet had used. “As for the rest, I couldn’t pity you if I tried. You’re the strongest mech I know, Ratch. And just so you know,” he added, leaning back to grin at him as he started to guide him to his berth. “This falls firmly into the _dream come true_ category. It’s not even close to the _pity frag_ zone. Okay?”

Ratchet laughed at the very idea of being anyone’s dream come true. “If you say so,” he replied, and left it at that as Drift gave him a goodnight kiss that was far too brief and then left. Well, even if Drift was just being kind by saying that, Ratchet couldn't really argue.

For him, tonight definitely counted as a _dream come true._

And as an unexpected but very welcome bonus, Ratchet slipped almost immediately into recharge and slept for the rest of the night without dreaming at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's your lyrics, and thanks again for your patience! I hope it was worth the wait. 😉
> 
> https://g.co/kgs/aMMj29 
> 
> edited to add that I had to change the chapter name since I found a much better one right after posting this because of COURSE I did... *facepalm*


	4. Radioactive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm waking up, I feel it in my bones  
> Enough to make my systems blow...  
> ...I'm radioactive, radioactive
> 
> ~ Imagine Dragons, Radioactive

Unfortunately for Ratchet, a solid night of recharge didn’t do anything to prevent hangovers. 

He groaned, rolling to his side and willing his tanks to stop churning. It had been a long fragging time since he’d been stupid enough to forget how to prevent a damn hangover. Yes, engaging his FIM chip had redirected the engex away from his processor enough to sober him up, but all that extra energy couldn’t just vanish. He should’ve known better than to fall into recharge without connecting to his recharge slab first to discharge and balance the excess energy, but he hadn’t exactly been thinking clearly at any point last night. This hangover was proof enough of that.

… although honestly, his hangover wasn’t anywhere near as bad as it should’ve been.

And he knew precisely why.

Ratchet covered his optics and groaned again, but there was no getting around the memory of exactly how he’d burned off so much of that overcharge. _Fragging pit,_ but Drift had gotten him off _hard_ last night. Ratchet’s circuits still thrummed with strut-deep satisfaction and he shivered at the memory of the speedster’s touch, his kiss, possessive and confident and thrilling and _slag him in the smelter,_ Ratchet wanted to experience that touch again… 

But along with the hangover came all the doubts the engex had drowned last night.

Last night Drift had indeed gotten Ratchet off harder than he’d ever experienced before, and what had Ratchet done for him? 

Not a damned thing.

He’d let Drift leave still revved enough that his field positively crackled with it. Had just flopped over in his berth and fallen asleep without even trying to help Drift with all that charge, and virgin he may be, but Ratchet damn well knew how to give his partner an overload. 

And he hadn’t even _offered._

_Great job, idiot,_ Ratchet thought with a scowl. He wouldn’t blame Drift at all if he reconsidered his offer after finding out that not only was Ratchet pitifully, shamefully inexperienced in the berth, he was greedy and inconsiderate, too. All right, so Ratchet had fully participated in those kisses and he'd groped Drift a bit, but most of what he’d done last night was hold on tight and take everything and anything Drift wanted to give him. Who’d want to spend a night pleasuring someone who wouldn’t even try to pleasure them in return? He groaned again and pulled the pillow over his face, unable to think of anything but how shamelessly he’d thrown himself at Drift, how he’d damn near _begged_ the speedster to frag him and how badly he still wanted that-- 

\--and _oh slag him to the smelter_ today was the weekly command staff meeting and _Ratchet would be sitting right across from Drift the whole time!_ His spike gave a definite twitch of interest at the thought of being close to the speedster again and his valve clenched. Ratchet jumped, completely caught off-guard by the sensations. 

Six million years of dormancy and his damn array just had to decide to get insistent _now._ Because of _course_ it slagging did.

“Oh no you fragging don’t,” Ratchet growled, reaching deep into his protocols and inputting medical override codes to _force-lock_ his damn panel closed. The thought of losing control over it again was horrible enough even without adding Rodimus and Ultra Magnus and Red Alert and slagging _Megatron_ into the mix and maybe this hangover would actually kill him and wouldn’t that be a fragging mercy right now…

… but unfortunately for Ratchet, while hangovers could occasionally make a mech _wish_ they were dead, they weren’t actually fatal.

Well, putting off the inevitable wouldn’t help anything, and arriving late and haggard would only invite questions Ratchet didn’t want to answer, so he finally dragged his aft out of the berth and stumbled to the dispenser to grab a cube. His tanks didn’t particularly want it, but he knew that skipping it would only make things worse, so he loaded the cube with additives and chugged it down before chasing it with a dose of systems decontaminant and a painkiller. 

And then, after only the most perfunctory of runs through the washracks, Ratchet stepped out to face his doom.

**

Drift awoke and stared at the ceiling for a long moment.

Then he pinched himself, _hard._

… yeah, definitely awake. 

He hadn't followed Ratchet into his hab last night intending to make a pass at him. He certainly hadn't gone in expecting to learn that this mech who had a reputation for debauchery that could rival any crew of drunken Wreckers put together was actually… well. 

Ratchet's confession had thrown him for a loop, to say the very least. 

And that was _before_ everything else that had happened…

... if, of course, it actually _had_ happened.

Bracing himself, Drift rolled out of berth to perform a far more important test than just pinching himself. Steeling his nerves, he went to the mirror, leaned in close, and examined his plating as hard as he could, searching for some kind of proof that he hadn’t been dreaming everything that had happened in Ratchet’s quarters last night, that it had all been real.

_Primus, please let it have been real!_

At first he found nothing beyond the smallest of dents on his lower lip, a tiny bruise that might have been from Ratchet nipping at his lips last night, but also could have been from Drift biting his own lip in the throes of a dream. That wasn’t enough proof. He bit that lip again now, looking harder, praying for something definitive.

It wasn’t until Drift was pressed almost up against the mirror, armor flared, straining to look at the shoulder struts mostly hidden beneath his fenders, that he finally found what he was seeking.

A smudge of red paint in a shade that didn’t match Drift’s own. 

He stared, caught between awe and utter disbelief, reaching up to carefully touch it. A miniscule transfer right where Drift remembered Ratchet clinging to his shoulders with desperate strength as he’d struggled to stay upright while Drift kissed him, caressed him, brought him to a screaming overload…

Drift leaned heavily against the wall, fans whirring to life and his own knees going weak this time. _It had really happened!_ Ratchet had truly confided in him last night, sharing something Drift knew he’d never told anyone else, gifting Drift with a trust far beyond anything he’d ever thought possible. And then he’d really held Ratchet, kissed him, touched him… he’d really heard Ratchet moan his name, desperate and staticked and so fragging sexy Drift had nearly overloaded right along with him.

_You, I want it to be you, oh Drift please--_

Drift moaned aloud at the memory, then groaned in dismay. He couldn’t go to the command meeting revved up like this! 

Somehow Drift managed to stagger to the washracks, charge surging and engine revving, barely making it beneath the spray before his panel snapped open. His spike pressurized straight into his hand and Drift stroked himself desperately as the memories overwhelmed him, Ratchet’s moans echoing in his audials, the heat of the medic’s powerful frame trembling against his, the insistent press against his palm as Ratchet’s spike tried to break free for the very first time. 

As Ratchet had lost control-- _Ratchet,_ losing control!--and it had all been because of _him_. Because Ratchet had wanted Drift so badly that he couldn’t fight his frame’s instinctive reactions, because he wanted Drift to take his seals, wanted to come to his hab tonight and let Drift love him all night long--

Drift cried out as he overloaded fast and hard, his hand never slowing as pleasure ravaged his frame and those erotic memories scorched his processor. When the overload passed, he hung his helm and panted, fans roaring, letting the cleanser run over him but being so careful not to let it touch that precious transfer hidden beneath his fender. 

And he was still so damn revved up that his plating trembled with it.

He was never going to get through today’s meeting without making a fool of himself, and he couldn’t imagine that Ratchet would appreciate Drift leaping across the table and pinning him to the wall again. “Primus save me,” he groaned, staring down at his spike, still stubbornly erect despite the overload he’d just had, and he didn’t have time to pleasure himself again--not to mention that he wasn’t sure another overload would make that much of a difference, either. He closed his optics and instead engaged the bootleg override codes he hadn’t had to use in millennia, forcing his aching spike to go the frag _down_ and locking both his inner cover and his panel over it. True, he’d originally acquired those codes to keep everyone else _out,_ not keep himself _in,_ but locked was locked, dammit.

Now all Drift needed to do was just _not think about last night._

He could only pray that between the overload and the codes, it would be enough to get him through the day without making a complete fool of himself.

**

 _Oh, it is not going to be enough,_ Drift thought as he entered the conference room and spotted Ratchet in his usual place at the table. It was all he could do to choke off a hungry rev of his engine. _It’s not going to be_ nearly _enough._

Ratchet didn’t look up when Drift and Rodimus entered, his optics fixed on his pile of datapads instead. Those optics were a bit dimmer than usual, his mouth drawn in its usual frown, his field locked down behind the _neutral/safe/soothing_ barrier that comprised a medic’s usual EMF projections. He looked hung over, to be honest, and Drift mentally kicked himself for not ensuring that Ratchet had plugged into his slab to help negate his overcharge before he’d left. Honestly, though, he’d been too desperate to think of it, aching to rush to his own hab and fall to his knees the instant his door closed, one hand working his spike and the other buried three fingers deep in his valve, bringing himself to overload after overload, until he’d slumped on the floor, utterly exhausted from pleasure…

 _… oh yeah, doing a fraggin’ great job not thinking about it,_ Drift thought, mentally slapping himself. _Get it together!_

Rodimus pinged him as they both took their seats. :: _Yo, babe, you okay?::_

Drift forced his gaze away from Ratchet, realizing that he’d been staring from the instant he’d entered the room. :: _Yeah, fine, sorry,::_ he replied over the private channel, meeting his amica’s concerned gaze. :: _It’s nothing, just… got a little distracted, I guess.::_

Rodimus looked doubtfully at him. :: _You sure? I know you’re hella thirsty for the Hatchet but you usually hide it a lot better. To borrow a phrase from the humans, that was some hard core eyefucking, bro.::_

Drift fought the surge of heat to his face, trying not to blush. He couldn’t argue with Rodimus--that was exactly what he’d been doing despite his determination not to. He _had_ to get himself under control before he embarrassed Ratchet and made him change his mind about coming over tonight!

\--but he _wasn’t thinking about that,_ and Drift mentally growled at himself. _::Had a dream,::_ he lied as they took their seats, because as much as he hated lying to his amica, he would never betray Ratchet’s trust by sharing his story with another.

 _::Must’ve been one hell of a dream,::_ Rodimus said, and now he was grinning. _::Maybe you should tell the good docbot all about it, see if he’ll help you reenact it.::_

 _::Maybe you should get this meeting going before I punch you in the face,::_ Drift shot back, ‘accidentally’ kicking Rodimus’ leg beneath the table.

 _::Such violence! I’m shocked at you,::_ Rodimus scolded, retaliating by rocking his chair back and ‘inadvertently’ whacking Drift’s knee. Megatron rolled his optics at them and they both ignored him. _::That’s gotta be conduct unbecoming of a holy knight--::_

_::I’m not a holy anything, sludgefragger--::_

_::Not while you’re having such naughty, unholy thoughts about taking a wild ride on the Party Ambulance,::_ Rodimus agreed, laughing down the line.

Drift sent an image of the rudest hand gesture he knew back to Rodimus, but his playful mood had vanished, abruptly extinguished right along with the desire he’d been trying to fight. Instead of remembering how gorgeous Ratchet had looked in overload or how beautifully he’d moaned into Drift’s kisses, now all Drift could see was the pain in Ratchet’s optics as he’d told Drift how that nickname had haunted him. All he could hear was the bitterness as he’d repeated his would-be lover’s words from so long ago.

_“No need to act coy, Ratchet, I’ve been dying to experience the Party Ambulance for myself!”_

And Ratchet had been so spooked by how his white lie had grown that he’d reacted by isolating himself, emotionally as well as physically. No one needed to tell Drift that Ratchet’s angry exterior was a defense mechanism, a deliberate way to keep everyone around him at an arm’s distance. He’d built walls around all his vulnerabilities and they’d gotten higher and thicker with every year that passed until now they were nigh impenetrable. 

And yet somehow, by some miracle, last night Drift had been allowed a glimpse inside them.

Last night had been far more than physical, and lust, even as strong as his ran for Ratchet, stood little chance against the wave of tender protectiveness that swept through Drift now, nearly overwhelming him.

He straightened in his chair as Ultra Magnus finally called the meeting to order and began handing out datapads with some special report Red Alert had compiled with Perceptor. Drift half tuned it out and told himself that could get himself together and pay proper attention like the officer he was, really he could. And he would, just as soon as he sent Ratchet a quick text to make sure he was all right this morning, because the more he looked at him, the more Drift noticed the little tells that said that the medic wasn’t simply hung over.

Ratchet was _nervous._

And Ratchet didn’t _do_ nervous.

Drift accepted the stack of datapads from Megatron, kept one and passed the rest down. He’d started to open a tab to send a message to Ratchet before the words at the top of the ‘pad sank in.

_RADIATION STORM EMERGENCY QUARANTINE PROCEDURES_

His optics snapped to Red Alert’s. “This is a drill?” he asked, because _quarantine_ looked an awful lot like _Ratchet’s not coming to his quarters tonight_ and that meant it had to be a drill, right? 

Ultra Magnus frowned at him, but his disapproval had been aimed at Drift so often that he was immune to it by now. “Apparently your attention wandered during my opening remarks,” he said, “or you would be aware that this is not a drill.”

Red Alert tapped a button on his datapad and Drift’s datapad, along with everyone else’s, flicked to show a scan of the quadrant surrounding the _Lost Light’s_ current position. The ship was a small icon surrounded by a near perfect ring of angry orange, red, and white clouds. The key in the corner ranked gamma ionizing radiation by color, with black reading lowest, scaling up through cool blues and greens and yellows as the risk increased.

The highest levels were orange, red, and white.

And the area immediately around the _Lost Light_ was already midway through the green scale and inching closer to yellow. 

Drift’s spark sank, and apparently his field control wasn’t what it should be either because Rodimus sent him a concerned _ping_ again, but all he could do was stare at what looked like radioactive death closing in all around them. Ratchet spoke before he could scrape his thoughts back into some semblance of order. “Can we jump out of this before it gets worse?”

Red Alert shook his head. “Perceptor and Brainstorm have been studying it ever since we detected this cloud closing in several hours ago. They’re not here because they’re still working on the problem, but they both agree that attempting to initiate a quantum jump in the current level of background radiation carries an unacceptable level of risk.”

“They _agree?”_ Rodimus said, and whistled low. “That’s… yikes.”

“That’s one way to put it,” Red agreed, and Drift sat back, feeling like he’d been punched. Rodimus _pinged_ him again more insistently but Red was still speaking. “But it isn’t all bad news. The _Lost Light_ is a well designed ship. Its vital systems are shielded to survive even the highest radiation levels of this ion storm, and there are certain crew members whose armor is rated able to withstand some of the higher levels. They will be able to man the bridge, engines, and medbay for most if not all of this emergency quarantine.”

Drift’s gaze went to Ratchet almost involuntarily, and the instant when their optics met sent a mixed bolt of _desire/dismay_ shivering down his spinal strut, but the medic almost immediately looked away. “I’ll review the crew’s medical records and ensure that we’ve got updated specs on everyone,” Ratchet said. “Not everyone has maintained their armor at full wartime levels. I see you’ve got me listed on the _high exposure approved_ list, but the repairs I received after Overlord don’t meet that standard.” He poked at the screen, moving his name to the _moderate exposure_ column instead as he spoke. “I’m sure I’m not the only one.”

Drift flipped to the list section and wasn’t surprised to see himself on the _minimal_ _exposure_ roster. His armor had never been created to withstand this kind of radiation, not in any of his redesigns and certainly not the new, light-weight, flexible frame he now wore. He’d be spending the duration of this storm confined to his heavily-shielded quarters.

His _Ratchet-free_ quarters.

Rodimus, of course, was on the _highest exposure_ list, which wasn’t a surprise with his sigma ability. “Guess I’m on duty throughout,” he said, and now that things were serious, so was he. Drift took comfort from knowing his amica would be up and around the entire time. For all his devil-may-care posturing, when the slag was about to hit the fan, Rodimus would do whatever it took to ensure his crew made it through just fine. Drift didn’t just love him as his amica endura, he was proud to call him Captain. 

“As am I,” Megatron said. He touched his datapad, moving his name from _unknown exposure rating_ to the _highest_ column. “I was built to withstand all types of radiation in the mines and I have kept that protection up to date.” And Drift was a bit less reassured by that, but he’d followed Megatron for millions of years and he knew that he was a competent commander, too.

At least when he wasn’t distracted by Optimus Prime.

Or Starscream.

Or his hatred of organics.

Or his lust for power… 

“I am also rated for highest-level exposure,” Ultra Magnus said, and Drift relaxed a little bit. Between him and Rodimus, they could keep Megatron in line if they had to.

“Well, looks like I’m the lightweight in the room,” Drift said, forcing the words to come out lightly when he really wanted to growl them. Even knowing that this wasn’t a failing, only a difference in design specs, he’d spent too many of his formative years learning a multitude of reasons why it was a bad idea to be the weakest person in a group and he’d never truly outgrown that. “Those of us who aren’t rated for radiation exposure will be--?”

“Confined to quarters,” Red Alert replied, which was about what Drift had expected. “The _Lost Light_ is quite a well-designed ship. All the hab suites have shielding rated for gamma ionizing radiation levels even higher than what we will be experiencing here. As soon as this meeting is finished, we will be making a ship-wide announcement notifying the crew of the situation. Those without energon dispensers will be directed to obtain sufficient fuel for the next three days, and any who are unable to do so for whatever reason will have energon delivered before radiation levels become too dangerous for them to open their doors for even short periods.”

Ratchet’s frown had deepened as he continued to scan the datapad. “Looks like medical will have our work cut out for us,” he said. “Are we almost done here? The sooner we can get started, the better.”

Red Alert nodded and Rodimus stood, no trace of his earlier playfulness to be found as he took command. “Yes. Red, thanks for getting this briefing together so fast for us. I know you must have a lot to oversee too, so we won’t keep you. Megs, Mags, report to my office to create a duty roster. Ratchet, keep us updated on what you need--Drift, coordinate between Medical and Command for as long as you can until you have to go into quarantine. Dismissed, everyone.”

But just to prove that even when he was taking charge as the serious, commanding Rodimus Prime, he was still Drift’s incorrigible amica at spark, Roddy sent Drift an eyebrow-waggling emoji with two thumbs-up and the message _::SWEET DREAMS!::_ on his way out of the room.

Drift had to fight not to snicker as he stood to follow the others out of the room, but then he noticed that Ratchet had taken a little longer to gather his datapads than the others and was still at the table. He hesitated, but he remembered the text he hadn’t gotten to send before the meeting and went back to the table. 

Ratchet glanced at him when he leaned a hip against the conference table but didn’t speak. Still, he seemed to be having a lot of trouble getting those four datapads to stack up, because he didn’t move away, and Drift took that as a good sign. “Hey,” he murmured. “How are you feeling this morning?”

Ratchet’s hands stilled. “You asking about my hangover?”

“If you want me to be.”

Ratchet snorted. “I’m hungover,” he said flatly.

Drift chuckled--such a perfect Ratchet non-answer. But he truly did want to know how Ratchet felt, because even if last night was the only time he ever got to touch Ratchet, he still treasured the medic’s friendship. He didn’t want to lose it. “Hate me this morning?” he asked softly. 

Ratchet’s vents cycled once, slow and deep, and then he glanced at Drift from the corner of his optic again. It lasted just an instant and then he looked back down at his datapads, but Drift didn’t see anger in that glance. “If you must know,” Ratchet growled, voice very low, “I don’t hate you, I’m just embarrassed as frag that I was selfish enough to let you walk out of there without _returning the favor,_ all right?”

Drift vented in sharply and he couldn’t help the deep rev of his engine at the very thought of Ratchet’s hands on him. A quick check confirmed his locks were still firmly in place as his temperature started to rise. “You weren’t selfish,” he said, wishing he was better with words so he could manage to say the right thing to reassure the medic, to express how incredible last night had been, how slagging _hot_ it had been to pleasure Ratchet so well that he could hardly walk to his berth afterward. “Ratchet, you were _amazing--_ you _are_ amazing.”

Ratchet shook his head, lips pressed together tightly, and Drift didn’t know what to say. Words were a lot easier when he was writing speeches for Rodimus, but now, with his own feelings, his own thoughts? His vocalizer locked and his processor blanked.

 _Frag it all,_ Drift thought, giving up and looking over his shoulder to make sure the door was still closed. 

He’d always been better at action, anyway.

Ratchet made a noise that Drift would never dare to call a _squeak_ when Drift caught his helm in both hands and kissed him full on the mouth. He didn’t bother easing into it, not here, not when anyone might walk in and catch him making such a blatant pass at the ship’s CMO, and during an emergency, too.

So Drift kept the kiss short, but _short_ didn’t mean that he didn’t also make it deep and passionate as hell. Last night Ratchet had asked Drift to kiss him like he truly wanted him, and Drift held nothing back then or now.

And Ratchet, oh thank Primus and the Five, Ratchet didn’t resist for a single _instant._

Drift broke away after only a few moments, fighting to keep his fans from kicking on just in case one of the others returned. “Ratchet, you didn’t need to do a damn thing last night. I loved every second of that,” he whispered, finally looking into Ratchet’s optics and seeing the vulnerability there--so strange to see on this mech who could deal with absolutely _anything_ and come out swinging, this mech who was the strongest person he'd ever known. Drift caressed his cheek before forcing himself to step back and let his hands drop. “There’s also this thing called _increasing the anticipation.”_

Ratchet finally smiled, just a hint of his usual smirk, but oh it wasn’t _fair_ what that did to Drift’s spark. “Hope you like _anticipation,_ then, because I don’t think either of us are getting any free time until after this slag is over.”

And if that smile had sent shivers through his spark, this confirmation that Ratchet was still planning to actually come to Drift to lose his seals nearly stopped its spin entirely. Drift flopped across the nearest chair, clutching his chest, hiding the tremble in his knees with the exaggerated movement. “Primus preserve me, this is so cruel,” he moaned. “This is going to last for three days! That much anticipation might kill me!”

Ratchet kicked the base of the chair, nearly spilling him out of it. “Then make sure you die quietly somewhere out of the way because I’m busy,” he said, and Drift couldn’t hold back the laugh that ruined his mournful expression. “And so are you so get your aft in gear.”

Drift laughed again and bounced back up. Ratchet rolled his optics at his energy, and it was familiar and comfortable and if he couldn’t have Ratchet spend the night in his hab tonight, this confirmation that he hadn’t ruined their friendship was the best consolation prize Drift could think of.

Well.

That and the kiss, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's taken so long to post this update, guys! Still, today's my birthday, and this is my birthday present to everyone who's reading and leaving kudos and reviewing! Y'all are amazing and awesome and fantastic and I can't tell you all what it means to me to read your reviews and get the kudos notification. When I'm having a bad day, I go back and read reviews, and it cheers me up so much. <3 Thank you, every single one of you, for helping to keep me writing and smiling. I love you all.


	5. Say Goodbye

Drift’s next few hours were a special kind of torture.

His duty to coordinate between Medical and Command meant that he was busy as slag, which should have been enough to keep him too distracted to think about anything else. Every single member of the crew had to have their records individually examined by the medical staff for radiation resistance and then sorted into risk groups, and then every single member of the crew had to be notified of their designation. With that information in mind, Drift took the duty rosters and either adjusted or entirely recreated them. Each deck of hab suites also had to be inspected to ensure that the listed radiation shielding matched the actual readings--a task split between Medical and Engineering--and multiple crew berthing assignments had to then be changed to accomodate the discrepancies they’d discovered. And not least of all, the energon stores also needed to be checked, and the radiation shielding around the energon itself had to be confirmed because no one wanted radioactive fuel at best or explosions at worst.

And because all of that _clearly_ wasn’t enough of a challenge to accomplish in the space of a few hours, all of it had to be coordinated by sending datapads via runners because the storm was already fragging up their communications to the point where even the overhead PA would soon be useless. It was easy to assume that his role in coordinating all of this barely-controlled chaos would take up every single bit of Drift’s processor space.

But Drift hadn’t been that near-illiterate leaker from the Dead End in a very long time, and what so many Autobots forgot was that Deadlock hadn’t only been notorious because he was a fearsome warrior on the battlefield. He’d risen to the rank of general in an army where there was no such thing as an honorary title. At one point he’d singlehandedly commanded a large portion of the Decepticons, a task that made this mess look downright _simple._ Drift had _vast_ amounts of experience in coordinating countless and ever-changing variables, managing troop movements and supply lines and Autobot strategies, all the while also balancing Starscream’s volatility against Soundwave's disdain and Shockwave’s logic and Megatron’s occasional irrationality… that _purple griffin_ incident was never going to stop being as hilarious as it was embarrassing.

So while this situation might be a busy one, it didn’t come close to overtaxing Drift’s abilities.

It did, however, require him to stay in constant proximity to Ratchet.

And sharing the CMO’s office while watching Ratchet take charge and hearing him giving orders in that deep, commanding, _don’t-argue-or-you’ll-regret-it_ voice that got results _or else,_ was _always_ going to turn Drift on. Ratchet’s strength, his skill, his complete mastery of his realm and the way he also balanced a thousand moving points of data and made it all look effortless, and especially the sheer _power_ of the medic’s determination to keep every single mech in his care safe… 

Primus strike him dead but that was beyond hot, and the way Drift's processor kept using its available capacity to ambush him with bits and pieces of last night in _vivid_ detail no matter how hard he kept trying to lock those memories away was _not slagging helpful!_

But what truly stood out the longer they worked together was the way Drift and Ratchet were able to coordinate their tasks, feeding each other information and anticipating each other’s needs, how smooth and natural it felt--well, that _more than_ got Drift’s engine revving. The two of them had spent so much time at the start of the _Lost Light’s_ mission butting heads that the realization that they could work together so very well was almost shocking. They made one hell of a team, and this was the truly dangerous thing about having so much free processor power. It gave Drift space to imagine how well they might fit together in other ways, in other situations. It made him think not only about how much he wanted Ratchet in his berth, but how much he wanted _more_ than a one night stand, no matter how special that one night would undoubtedly be.

And _wanting more_ had never gone particularly well for Drift. 

The overhead speakers clicked on and Rodimus’ voice could just be understood over the static. “Everyone rated for minimum exposure, report to your hab and close yourself in immediately. If you haven’t gotten energon, don’t try get it now. Put a sign on your door and fuel will be brought to you. This is your final warning. Moderate and high exposure groups, be advised that future warnings will be given via emergency klaxon. One burst marks first warning, two marks your second warning, and three bursts means _drop everything and haul aft._ I repeat, all mecha rated for minimum exposure, you are ordered to report to your quarters _now._ Rodimus out.”

Ratchet finally looked up from the masses of datapads covering his desk and met Drift’s optics. “That’s you,” he said, and was that a hint of disappointment in his voice? Drift didn’t dare to hope that the medic had been thinking along the same lines that he had, but that damned extra processing capacity was determined to keep tormenting him, it seemed. “You need to get to safety.”

Drift sighed. He wasn’t finished with his work, but even more than that, he wasn’t ready to give up the experience of working so closely and so well with Ratchet. He kept typing. “I’ll be fine a little longer,” he said dismissively even though his own radiation sensors were flashing warnings at him. “I just got a request from Red Alert, I can take the time to finish it up before I go.”

Ratchet shook his head and tried to take the datapad from Drift’s hands. He stubbornly held on, earning a glare for his trouble. “You won’t be _fine a little longer,_ you’re right up against your tolerance levels,” Ratchet growled, complete with air-quotes. “And you damn well know it, too.”

Drift’s typing slowed before he finally lowered the datapad. Ratchet was right. “I hate this,” he said, voice angry but low enough not to carry beyond their little bubble. “I’ve never been the type to hide and be useless in a crisis, dammit.”

To his surprise, Ratchet actually reached out and briefly squeezed his forearm in an uncharacteristically comforting gesture. “You’ve been anything but _useless,_ and it’s no weakness to keep yourself safe from an enemy you can’t fight,” he replied just as quietly. Drift’s optics darted to Ratchet’s, surprised at how the medic had cut right to the heart of his feelings. The medic used that moment of surprise to deftly swipe the datapad from his hands. “I’ll finish this. Go on, get out of here. You’ve got time to get to your hab before you start taking damage but only if you get your aft in gear.”

Drift hesitated a moment longer. He knew he had to go, but now it wasn’t the desire to finish his work that was making him pause--he knew he couldn’t have what he really wanted, but Drift would settle for kissing Ratchet goodbye like he had at the end of this morning's meeting. But it wasn’t a good idea and he knew it. Ratchet’s office was nothing even remotely approaching private right now, open as it was to the packed medbay and with runners dashing in and out in a near-constant stream. No, Drift knew better than to try to kiss Ratchet, not here--knew he’d already been damn lucky to get away with it even once.

But all the logic in the universe wouldn’t make the desire go away.

 _Stop wanting more, you masochistic idiot,_ Drift growled at himself. _When will you learn to just be happy with what you’ve been given?_

Ratchet’s optics narrowed at Drift when he didn’t move. “Did I fragging stutter, Drift?” he growled in the _obey-or-suffer_ voice that never failed to send a shiver down his spinal strut. “Get to your quarters!”

“I’m going, I’m going,” Drift sighed, raising his hands in surrender. Still, he paused in the doorway long enough to pin Ratchet with a glare. “And _you_ better take shelter when it’s your turn, too.”

Ratchet rolled his optics. “Yeah, yeah, whatever, will you get out of here already before your diodes start melting?”

That wasn’t a promise but Drift knew it was as good as he was going to get. Still, even despite the seriousness of the situation, he couldn’t resist a parting shot. “Oh, don’t worry about me, Ratch, I have faith that Primus will see me safely to my hab,” he said brightly as he finally turned away. “And I can use the time alone to meditate and pray for the crew--hey, I’ll start with you! Oh Primus, keep Ratchet safe from the radiation and keep him from frying his circuits because he's a stubborn old slagger who won't take cover when he's ordered to--”

A wrench bounced off his shoulder. “Get the _frag_ outta my medbay, kid,” Ratchet growled, and Drift laughed, finally leaving to transform and speed toward his hab suite.

 _At least three days until I see him again,_ he thought a little desperately, and wondered how he was going to make it that long.

***

Ten hours later, Drift was almost willing to brave the radiation just to have a distraction.

This fragging storm was a curse from Unicron Himself.

Drift didn’t think of himself as a mech who _needed_ others around, but he’d also never had much experience with solitude. The Dead End hadn’t been safe for a mech alone, so he’d stuck close to Gasket and his group of down-and-outs. The Decepticons hadn’t been a lot different, and even when he’d climbed in the ranks enough to have a hab of his own, the war had kept him so busy that he’d rarely spent any more time there than recharge demanded. Wing hadn’t left him alone for one fragging second in New Crystal City, either, and the Wreckers lived practically on top of each other in their small ship.

Honestly, the only time in his life that Drift had been truly _alone_ had been the brief time he’d spent on Earth between leaving New Crystal City and running into the Wreckers, and he’d been surrounded by humans even if he hadn’t interacted with them.

And he’d _chosen_ that, and prepared for it, too.

He couldn’t even comm Rodimus to relieve his boredom because the storm had fragged up their communications. Besides, even if Drift could call out, Rodimus would be far too busy for pointless chatter anyway.

So to say that Drift wasn’t enjoying being confined to quarters in total isolation without having the chance to lay in something, _anything_ for entertainment, was something of an understatement. 

Drift had tried hard to find things to keep him busy. He’d napped for an hour when he’d first sealed himself into his quarters, but he didn’t need more sleep now. Then he’d taken a long, _long_ shower, allowing himself to luxuriate in the hot cleanser running over his frame in a way he never had time to in normal circumstances. He’d detailed his frame the best he could alone, stopping short of buffing himself to a mirror shine but still spending much more time on self-care than usual.

He’d sharpened and polished his swords, then practiced his sword forms as well as possible in the confined space. He’d looked over the datapads he’d stashed with the intention of reading if he ever had time only to find that he’d already read them all, had even tried playing games on the precious, carefully-rigged human system he’d acquired on Earth. The problem was that most of his games were two-player ones that he usually played with Roddy, and he’d beaten his few single-player games too many times for them to truly hold his attention anymore. He’d stared out his window at the swirling colors outside, admiring the view of the storm as beautiful as it was deadly, and tried to see shapes in the dancing tendrils of light until even that lost its entertainment value.

Anything to put off what he knew he really should do, which was meditate.

Drift didn’t want to meditate. He knew exactly where his processor would go, and he didn’t want to focus on the memories of Ratchet right now. He didn’t want to think about how badly he yearned to help Ratchet with his seals, how desperately he wanted to do it _right_ so Ratchet didn’t have the kind of experience that Drift had suffered. He especially didn’t want to think about the three-day delay they were forced to endure before Ratchet came to him, because that meant three extra days for Ratchet to have second thoughts and talk himself out of taking Drift up on his offer at all.

Drift would never push. If Ratchet changed his mind, he would certainly respect that and never mention it again.

But Drift really, truly, _desperately_ didn’t want Ratchet to change his mind.

He sighed. He knew what Wing would say about this avoidance--it only proved how much Drift _needed_ to meditate and try to come to some kind of peace about this, because even if it wasn’t unhealthy to ignore his thoughts and desires, he clearly wasn’t having much success doing so anyway. He sighed, finally giving into the inevitable. Drift spread his mat in front of his sword rack and sank down, trying to clear his mind as the warning siren for the next group of mecha to get to quarters sounded outside. 

This would be the first warning for Ratchet’s group, actually, Drift thought. Primus, he hoped that someone would make sure that Ratchet actually _went_ to his hab instead of ignoring the warning. If Drift hadn’t been trapped in his own quarters, _he_ would’ve made sure the medic made it to safety, no matter how much he protested. Drift wished he’d taken the time to grab Ultra Magnus or First Aid to make them promise to ensure that Ratchet didn’t conveniently _forget_ to take cover. Much as Drift admired Ratchet’s drive to heal, Ratchet also had a bad habit of ignoring his own safety in favor of helping others.

Drift closed his optics, thinking of the procedures they would be using to ensure that everyone got through this safely. Now that the moderate-exposure group was heading to their quarters, the high-exposure teams would begin sweeping the ship, going door-to-door both to ensure that everyone had adequate fuel and to make sure no one had missed or disregarded their orders to seal themselves in. Drift had helped coordinate those plans and had assigned the teams, and it was as good a thing to think about as anything else while he circled carefully around the memories of touching Ratchet last night. 

_Those teams will make sure Ratchet locks himself in his hab,_ Drift reassured himself, listening to the second warning sound now. _Whether he likes it or not._

As though summoned by his thoughts, someone knocked at his door. Drift jumped up, eager for even this much of a distraction from his solitary boredom. He hurried to the door and reached for the intercom just as a staticky voice crackled through it. _“Hab inspection, unlock your door and back away.”_

That… wasn’t the script for the quick wellness checks that he and Ratchet had planned. Drift glanced over his shoulder at the light show outside his window, wondering if it was a weak point in spite of the extra shielding built into the plasteel. Fragging pit, he did _not_ want to spend the next few days confined to his washracks to get away from the window--it was bad enough already without restricting his limited space even further! He pushed the button and said, “Is there a problem? I’m not reading harmful radiation levels in here.”

 _“My sensors are better calibrated than yours,”_ the other mech said, as best as Drift could make out, anyway. _“Unlock your door and move to safety.”_

Drift sighed. There was really nothing he could do about it, so he did as requested and punched in his door code before backing all the way across his hab so he wouldn’t get hit with a blast of radiation when his door opened. The mech waited several seconds after the door beeped with the notification that it was unlocked, giving Drift ample time to move away.

And then the door opened and Ratchet ducked in, quickly keying the door closed behind him before turning and looking at Drift, and the expression in his optics was that same combination of _determined_ and _vulnerable_ that he’d worn the night before.

Drift gaped at him, utterly stunned. He’d never thought Ratchet would voluntarily leave his office before the final warning, had been certain that First Aid would have to shove him through the door that connected the CMO’s hab to the medbay and lock Ratchet in there to get him to take cover. 

But he’d left in enough time to make it across the ship to Drift’s hab, and there was only one explanation for it.

Ratchet hadn’t wanted to wait any more than Drift did.

Ratchet opened his mouth to speak just as the siren wailed in three short bursts outside--the signal that radiation levels had risen to a point too dangerous for any mecha who weren’t on the highly resistant list. Ratchet glanced up at the sound, then tried again. “So…” he said, awkward in a way Drift couldn’t ever remember seeing him, “I probably should’ve asked before inviting myself over like this.”

Drift was in motion from the first word, but he forced himself to stop several steps away from Ratchet. Any closer than that and he might not be able to stop himself from pulling the medic into his arms, holding him tight, kissing him, and dammit he needed to _get his fragging mind back where it was supposed to be!_

Despite the mental shake, it took Drift two tries to get his vocalizer to work, and even then his voice was husky and touched with static as he said, “You’re always welcome here, Ratch.” _Don’t presume, don’t pressure,_ he mentally chanted over and over, trying to get a grip on the mixture of _hope_ and _desire_ and _nervousness_ that threatened to choke him.

Ratchet shifted, almost fidgeting, before he visibly forced himself to stop. He ran one hand over his face in a weary gesture Drift had seen all too often. “This was either a great idea or the next few days are gonna be awkward enough to make going back out into the radiation seem like a good time,” he muttered into his hand, and Drift had absolutely no response for that.

Luckily no response was apparently required because Ratchet finally raised his head, squared his shoulders, and looked Drift straight in the optics. Despite it all, Drift knew him well enough by now to still see the nervousness he was trying so hard to hide behind the bravado. Ratchet took a step forward, putting them within EMF range now, and said, "Drift, I've waited almost seven million years for an opportunity like this and I’m slagging _tired_ of waiting. I am dead sober right now and if you really meant that you'd be willing to frag the oldest sealed mech in Cybertronian history, I’m here to take you up on it,” speaking so quickly that it sounded almost rehearsed.

Drift’s vents opened with a _whoosh_ as his fans kicked on hard. He scrambled to speak before any pause could make Ratchet second-guess himself. “Yeah,” Drift managed hoarsely. Ratchet still had that professionally calm "on-duty" field engaged but Drift let his own EM projections press _admiration_ and _certainty_ and _anticipation_ against it. He took a single, careful step closer. “Yeah, Ratch, I meant everything I said.” 

Ratchet closed his optics and the tension of his frame released all at once, underscoring just how on-edge he had been. That neutral mask over his field wavered and finally vanished, the professional wall of _calm/reassuring_ cut off to be replaced by _anxious/determined/embarrassed_ and beneath it all, trying to hide but still there, the unmistakable heat of _arousal._ Oh, Ratchet’s field was utterly intoxicating and Drift drank it in, held it close, stored it deep in his memory banks to savor again and again.

And then Drift reached out, hand open, a silent invitation bridging the space between them.

Ratchet stared down at that hand, his field momentarily freezing. “And you're sure this isn't a pity frag?” he demanded, even as he rubbed his palms over his thighs in a nervous gesture that looked so incongruous on such a confident mech.

Drift’s hand didn’t move. “Believe me,” he said with complete honesty, “pity is absolutely the _last_ thing I’m feeling right now.”

Ratchet glanced up sharply to search Drift’s gaze. Drift hid nothing, didn’t even try, and Ratchet must have found whatever reassurance he sought because that moment of tension slowly bled from his field. When one of his hands finally rose and slipped into Drift’s, it only trembled a little, and Drift knew he'd been dead wrong.

This storm was no curse. It was clearly a blessing straight from Primus Himself.

And he wasn't going to waste another second of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't lie, this song is a HUGE part of the inspiration for this fic, so this time I'm actually linking to the song itself instead of only the lyrics because I find this song just so... god _damn..._ sexy. 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Df5dmYvmB4
> 
> So here we are tonight,  
> You and me together  
> The storm outside, and the fire's bright  
> Oh and in your eyes I see  
> What's on my mind  
> You've got me wild  
> Turned around inside  
> And then desire, see, is creeping  
> Up heavy inside here  
> And I know you feel the same way as I do  
> Now let's make this an evening  
> Lovers for a night, lovers for tonight  
> ...  
> and tomorrow, go back to being friends
> 
> (also see iopele spend 3 hours searching for a song to use for this chapter before giving up and using the one _she had in mind in the first fucking place_ aaaaarrrrgggghhhh brain whyyyyyyy)


	6. Teach Me Tonight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is flung forcefully at the amazing protectobots for LIVE TWEETING THEIR REACTIONS TO READING THIS ENTIRE FIC that killed me extra super dead and then resurrected me! THANK YOU FOR GIVING ME LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ratchet pulled Ambulon into his office after Drift’s departure and wasted no time in bringing the former Decepticon up to speed. First Aid did technically outrank him, but out of all the medics on Ratchet’s staff, Ambulon had the best armor--made sense, a mech had to be built extra tough to be part of a combiner team--and that was the deciding factor. First Aid would have to take cover at some point himself, but Ambulon would barely even notice the highest radiation levels anticipated in this storm. Seniority aside, that made him the logical choice to take over from Ratchet, and First Aid just nodded and agreed when Ratchet told them his decision.

Which was a welcome change from the times Ratchet had been forced to delegate command to someone else when he’d been stationed at Deltaran with Pharma.

Like any experienced medic, Ambulon picked up the information quickly and jumped into the thick of it without hesitation or asking stupid questions. Ratchet worked diligently with him, hours flying by as he worked to tackle as much of the too-long and still growing To Do list as he could before he, like Drift, was forced to take cover.

_Drift…_

Ratchet closed his optics briefly, remembering how Drift had stopped in the doorway and looked back at him before he’d finally left for his quarters. That look in his optics, the way his expression had changed from the single-minded focus on their work to turn that dangerous focus back on _Ratchet_ … had anyone ever looked at Ratchet that way before, as though nothing in the universe mattered more than touching him? He had no defenses against that--had momentarily forgotten everything but the taste of Drift’s lips, and if the speedster had strode over to kiss Ratchet like he had after the officers’ meeting, Ratchet would’ve gone willingly.

Eagerly.

Unfortunately--or maybe it was fortunately--a runner had darted past just behind Drift at that moment, reminding Ratchet that his office was about as private as the middle of Swerve’s during happy hour right now. He’d gotten hold of himself and growled at Drift to go on, _get to safety,_ and Drift’s entire manner changed in an instant. He’d smiled and teased Ratchet about praying to Primus for his safety, that intense, laser-sharp hunger vanishing from face and frame like they had never been.

Ratchet _really_ needed to learn how to do that, because he’d still had trouble venting for several minutes after Drift finally left. 

He forced his processor back the task at hand now, but he’d actually accomplished just about all he could do. He finished entering an answer into the datapad in his hand, sent it out with Sunstreaker to deliver to Ultra Magnus, and didn’t pick up another one. “I’ve got a few minutes more at best, Ambulon,” he said, checking the ambient radiation level on his HUD. “What do you need before I leave this in your hands?”

True to Ratchet’s prediction, the first warning for the moderate-exposure group drowned out Ambulon’s first attempt at a reply. He paused, then tried again. “Just make sure your datapads are in some sort of order,” he said, waving a hand at the piles in front of Ratchet. “And don’t make me drag you out of here.”

Ratchet rolled his optics but quickly shuffled his work into orderly stacks. It took only moments and he clapped a hand on the younger medic’s shoulder when he finished. “You’ve got this,” he told him, squeezing briefly and letting go before his field control could slip. He didn’t want to have to explain the mix of _anticipation/nervousness/excitement_ and he wasn’t certain he was entirely hiding it even now. He transferred temporary CMO access codes to Ambulon, officially handing off duty. “And I’ll even make it easy on you and get out of here now, no dragging required.”

“Wonders never cease,” Ambulon said drily. “Try to enjoy the time off, unexpected as it is, will you? Spend a little time in berth, it’ll do you good.”

Ratchet’s engine choked but he snorted a laugh in an attempt to hide the sound. “Yeah, cuz I’m real good at taking it easy,” he replied, and Ambulon shook his head at him and pointed sternly at the door that connected his office to the short corridor that led to the CMO’s quarters. Ratchet opened the door and waved over his shoulder. “Be safe, kid. See you in a few days.”

And the instant his office vanished behind him, he darted down the short connecting corridor and burst through the door to his quarters, fuel pump pounding, spark feeling too big for its chamber.

He was going to do this. He was really going to do this.

… was he _really_ going to do this?

Drift’s face rose in his mind, the hunger burning in his optics as he’d watched Ratchet overload the night before, the way he kissed--slag him broken, _the way Drift kissed--_ and how fragging _incredible_ his touch had felt, how tightly he’d held Ratchet as he’d overloaded hard enough to damn near bluescreen his processor.

… oh yeah, he was _definitely_ going to do this.

Ratchet didn’t bother to grab anything as he rushed through his hab toward the main door to the passageway--didn’t need to get fuel, officers’ quarters had dispensers built in, couldn’t think of anything else he might need. And even though his stash of engex tempted him hard, calling for him to take the edge off his nervousness with a shot of liquid courage, he didn't dare. Didn't need to be told that Drift would keep him firmly at arm's length if Ratchet came to him with engex on his breath.

But mostly he didn’t dare pause in case any delay made him lose his nerve. 

Once he was out in the hallway, Ratchet transformed into his ambulance mode and raced to the lift, lights flashing but siren quiet so not to confuse anyone about when to get to their own quarters. The emergency lights were enough to get everyone out of his way, anyway, and he vented a little easier when the lift doors closed behind him.

Ratchet had just finished transforming when the lift stopped at the officers’ level, and Ratchet started to rush out when he caught sight of Megatron at the other end of the corridor, clearly just beginning his portion of the shipwide safety checks.

How had he forgotten that the officers' quarters had been assigned to Megatron? 

_Frag!_

The entire _point_ of this was to get to Drift’s quarters without anyone noticing that Ratchet wasn’t in his own! Megatron looked up and nodded to Ratchet, which meant that it was too late to turn bumper and run back to his own hab--that would do nothing but raise questions. Ratchet nodded back and forced himself to stride normally out of the lift, processor racing for a good excuse to be here, because Megatron would definitely ask why Ratchet was checking habs on the floor assigned to him.

Especially when the second warning sounded and Megatron would damn well know that Ratchet was meant to be heading for his _own_ hab right now.

Ratchet reached Drift’s door before Megatron could get close enough to ask any questions. He forced himself to look like he knew exactly what he was doing as he punched the intercom button and opened his mouth to speak with absolutely no idea what he was about to say.

Luckily, instincts honed over a lifetime of handling medical emergencies kicked in before he could make it any clearer that he wasn’t where he was supposed to be. “Hab inspection,” Ratchet said, leaning close to the ‘com and speaking slow and clear. Hopefully the thing would work well enough that Drift would be able to understand him, and the added bonus was that it ensured Megatron could hear him, too. “Unlock your door and back away.”

There was an instant of hesitation before the ‘com crackled to life. “Is there a problem? I’m not reading harmful radiation levels in here,” Drift replied, his words just understandable through the buzzing static interference.

Megatron was almost to him now, frowning in concern. Ratchet waved him back. “I’ve got this,” he said, injecting his voice with his usual mix of impatience and confidence and hoping like frag that Megatron bought the act. “Probably nothing but I’ve got to check.” To Drift, he responded, “My sensors are better calibrated than yours. Unlock your door and move to safety.”

“You should be in your own hab by now,” Megatron said, his frown deepening as he finally reached Ratchet’s side. “What will you do if Drift’s quarters _are_ compromised?”

Ratchet thought fast, hoping that the red lock indicator would turn to green soon. “If there’s a flaw in his shielding, it’ll be the window,” he said, gambling that this assertion wouldn’t be questioned. Either Drift’s suite actually was one with a plasteel window or Megatron wouldn’t have been inside it to know for sure either way--otherwise Ratchet was about to get caught in a lie and he really didn’t want to have to explain the _real_ reason for his presence here. “I’ve got materials with me to fix it,” he added, patting his plating near his subspace.

The light _finally_ flashed to green and Ratchet forced himself to wait instead of immediately escaping through it. Drift still needed to move far enough away that he wouldn’t be exposed to a harmful amount of radiation when Ratchet slipped inside. “You don’t have time to return to your own hab now,” Megatron pointed out, frown deepening and optics sharp. “You know that you’re going to be trapped in there for the duration of this emergency, yes? I cannot allow you to leave and compromise your safety.”

Ratchet sighed and rolled his optics. “Believe me, I am well aware of that,” he growled, allowing all his frustration at Megatron to fuel his tone. “I won’t commit murder due to an overdose of religion, if that’s what you’re worried about. Now if there’s nothing else, I’d really like to get inside before the radiation gets any worse out here,” he added, pointedly reaching for the latch.

Megatron stared hard at him for a moment longer, then finally nodded and lifted his datapad. “Then I will mark you both down as _confirmed in safe shelter,_ doctor,” he said, finally turning away to return to his duties, but not before Ratchet caught the glint of humor in his optics. “Good luck, and may Primus be with you.”

“Don’t you fragging start too,” Ratchet muttered, restraining the surge of pure _relief_ from showing in his voice or field. He heard Megatron chuckle quietly and made a rude gesture behind his back before finally opening Drift’s door and getting inside as quickly as he could.

But when the door slammed behind him, locking him inside the hab as Drift audibly gasped, that relief evaporated as a rush of nerves froze Ratchet’s vocalizer and locked his frame. _Oh frag me what am I doing this was a terrible idea why did I just show up I should have talked to him about this!_ repeated over and over in his processor, the fear of rejection that had been his constant companion for damn near his entire functioning swamping him. _What am I doing what am I doing what am I_ **_doing--_ **

He deleted the panicky processor string, ruthlessly ripping it out despite how hard it fought to maintain its grip. Only then did Ratchet force himself to turn around and look at Drift as the final warning echoed outside, confirming that he had indeed trapped himself here. Drift stared at him, jaw dropped, complete shock in his optics and every line of his frame so fragging beautiful Ratchet could hardly stand it, and he reset his vocalizer with a click. _Say something, you malfunctioning glitch, say something to him!_ he snarled mentally. 

“So…” he managed weakly, “I probably should’ve asked before inviting myself over like this.” And then he was kicking himself again, because when he’d first thought of this half-witted excuse for a plan, he’d imagined coming in and smiling seductively and saying something smooth and sexy, yet here he was basically apologizing for bothering Drift instead!

Still, it seemed to work at first, because suddenly Drift was crossing the space between them as though drawn by a magnet. He came to an abrupt stop just out of reach, though, and before Ratchet could start overanalyzing that, he said, “You’re always welcome here, Ratch,” in a low, husky tone that made Ratchet’s panels strain against the codes all by itself.

And wasn’t that just a fantastic reaction when Drift hadn’t even touched him yet--hadn’t even said he was _going_ to touch him? How humiliating would it be to throw himself at Drift now and beg him to frag him only to get turned down again? Ratchet rubbed a hand over his face and couldn’t keep from muttering to himself, “This was either a great idea or the next few days are gonna be awkward enough to make going back out into the radiation seem like a good time…”

But the time for second-guessing had passed the moment he’d snuck out of his quarters and sped down the hall in ambulance mode. There was nothing to do now but brazen it out. Ratchet gathered all his determination, squared his shoulders, and raised his helm to look Drift straight in the optics. 

To find Drift looking back at him like he’d just had the best gift in the universe dropped right in front of him and was fighting hard not to reach out and _grab it._

That look was a dose of much-needed courage. _You threw yourself at him last night and that worked out pretty well,_ Ratchet thought, and he took a step forward, bringing them into the edge of field range as he finally managed to say the words he’d been mentally rehearsing all day.

“Drift, I’ve waited almost seven million years for an opportunity like this and I’m slagging tired of waiting,” Ratchet said, forcing the words to come out steadily instead of betraying just how fragging nervous he really was. “I am dead sober right now and if you really meant that you’d be willing to frag the oldest sealed mech in Cybertronian history, I’m here to take you up on it,” he finished in a rush, spark whirling far too fast and fuel pump pounding with nervousness.

Thank mercy, Drift didn’t leave him in suspense for an instant. His fans kicked on hard, field rushing out to press an intoxicating mix of _admiration/certainty/anticipation_ against Ratchets, even his biolights flaring in an instinctive display that kicked Ratchet’s arousal up a notch. The speedster took a step closer, letting their fields mingle more strongly. “Yeah,” he said, and now Ratchet could hear the static in his words. “Yeah, Ratch, I meant everything I said.” 

_He wasn’t going to turn Ratchet away!_

The relief of not being rejected was almost enough to turn his knees to rubber. Ratchet vented deeply, so glad that he hadn’t fragged everything up that he couldn’t begin to hide it.

And then Drift held out a hand, palm-up, which momentarily brought all the nervousness back full-force.

“And you’re _sure_ this isn’t a pity frag?” Ratchet forced out, even as he wondered if that even mattered anymore, if he’d want Drift any less if it was.

Drift’s field bloomed against his, full of _desire_ and _eagerness_ and something that felt a whole lot like _awe,_ and nowhere in the mix did Ratchet find the pity he feared. “Believe me, pity is the _last_ thing I’m feeling right now,” Drift said, and Ratchet… believed him.

Found the courage to take the final leap.

Reached out and took Drift’s offered hand.

And went willingly when Drift pulled him into his arms, into a kiss every bit as intoxicating as any they’d shared last night, for all that it was slower, softer. Ratchet’s fans clicked on and he didn’t fight the moan rising in his throat when Drift’s free hand slipped over his chest, up to cradle his jaw, thumb brushing over his throat. He was done fighting, done hiding, done _waiting._

Ratchet surrendered.

And oh, Drift felt it the moment he did, if the surge of his engine and the tightening of his arms were anything to go by. 

And Drift _liked_ it too, if the brief sting of long-concealed claws against Ratchet’s plating and the growling bite on his lower lip was anything to go by, the barely-there prick of fangs thrilling on the thin metal a reminder of the speedster’s rough edges, making Ratchet moan all over again.

Drift held him tighter for a moment, kiss firming into something that promised to send fire through Ratchet’s lines, before Drift pulled away like he had to force himself to do it. “What’s your fuel level?” he rasped, holding their frames a hands breadth apart.

It took Ratchet a moment to focus his processor on anything but sensation and anticipation. When he did, he frowned. “It’s fine, I won’t need anything for a while yet. Don’t you have a dispenser in here?” he added, because if Drift didn’t, Ratchet could always dip into the emergency stash of medgrade energon in his first aid kit. “I’ve got enough for myself, don’t worry.” Why were they talking about fuel instead of kissing anyway?

“Give me a number, Ratchet,” Drift said, stubbornly resisting Ratchet’s attempt to press closer.

Ratchet glanced at his face, saw the futility of trying to dissuade Drift from this, and rolled his optics. “Seventy-three percent,” he said. “Happy?”

Drift kissed him again, but only on the tip of his nose. “Oh, I’m way beyond happy,” he said, but instead of kissing Ratchet again, he started pulling him across the room toward his sitting area. “Just not about your fuel levels. Take a seat, I’ll get you a cube.”

Ratchet stared at him, momentarily too derailed to protest being towed toward the couch instead of Drift’s berth, which he could see now was a double-sized model buried under a mound of pillows and blankets beneath the window that showed the fantastic light-show of the radiation storm. He _really_ wanted to go that way instead, but by the time his processor had caught up with events, Drift was already pushing him down onto the couch and leaving him there to go draw a pair of cubes from the dispenser. “Do you like additives in your energon?” he asked, going through several cabinets, rummaging in the back of one and pulling things out of another before setting one half-full cube aside and shaking a generous amount of the additives he’d selected into it.

Ratchet stared a moment longer, still confused, before remembering his decision to surrender to this, to let Drift guide him and trust him to know what he was doing. “I… I usually don’t have time to bother with them,” he admitted, watching Drift stir his cube in a swirl of colors reminiscent of the storm outside. “But sometimes I throw in some copper shavings?” He hadn’t meant it to come out as a question, but he couldn’t help it. How did Drift kiss him with that much heat and then just turn it off to discuss how he liked to prepare his energon?

Drift sent him a smile over one shoulder, a brief grin and flash of optics that was still more than enough for Ratchet to see that the heat hadn’t left Drift’s gaze at all. Unfortunately that only confused him more. “I’ve got that,” Drift said, finishing mixing his own half cube and reaching for another container to add a generous sprinkle of copper curls to Ratchet’s full one. 

Then he carried the cubes to the couch, setting his aside before perching on the conversation table in front of Ratchet and handing him the full cube although he didn’t seem interested in his own fuel. “Let’s get you closer to 100%,” he said, urging Ratchet to raise the cube when he just raised an eyebrow instead of drinking. Drift’s lips curved in a devastatingly gorgeous smile and he leaned forward, bracing his hands on Ratchet’s knees. “I plan to thoroughly exhaust you, Ratchet, and I want your energy levels up for it,” he purred, and it was a good thing Ratchet _hadn’t_ taken a sip yet, because he damn near choked on nothing at all and if he’d had a mouthful of fuel, he’d have probably died.

As it was, it took a considerable amount of self control not to gulp down the cube at an embarrassing pace. Ratchet took a drink--a _single_ drink, dammit, because he was determined not to show just how eager he was. “Is that a promise?” he asked, and if he couldn’t make his vocalizer produce the same kind of ruthlessly sexy purr Drift’s was capable of, the way Drift’s optics sharpened and his hands tightened on Ratchet’s knees seemed to indicate that the speedster liked the gravelly sound of his voice just fine.

“Drink your fuel and find out,” Drift shot back, hands inching up his thighs at a glacial pace that was as thrilling as it was frustrating, and Ratchet decided that dignity was overrated.

The fuel was gone in moments and he didn’t even mind Drift’s smirk when he dispersed the empty cube. “What’s your level now?” Drift asked, thumbs beginning to move in extremely distracting circles over his plating as his hands continued their slow journey.

“N-ninety six,” Ratchet managed, and he didn’t have time for anything else before Drift was suddenly in his lap, thighs bracketing his hips, Ratchet’s fans speeding up a notch at the weight of the speedster abruptly straddling his legs. 

“Close enough,” Drift said against his lips and Ratchet gasped into his kiss, but just like last time, it didn’t last nearly long enough for him. He groaned in frustration when Drift pulled away yet again, and Drift nuzzled his jaw. “Trust me,” he breathed against his plating, sending shivers through Ratchet. 

“I do,” Ratchet whispered. It felt important to say it, and this time it was Drift who shuddered.

But the barely-there flick of a fingertip over his panel still made Ratchet jump. “Open this for me,” Drift said, and Ratchet couldn’t hide the surge of misgivings in his field or the way his frame instinctively balked. Drift had him running so hot even now that his spike was already straining against the medical overrides keeping it locked down--if he opened his panel now, there would be nothing at all stopping it from shredding its way through its seal. 

And even as revved up as Ratchet already was, he knew his seals weren’t soft enough yet for that to happen without it hurting like a bitch.

Drift felt it all, but he didn’t remove his fingertip from its resting place on his panel. “Ratchet, please, _trust me,_ ” Drift murmured again, and he raised his head to meet Ratchet’s optics. His gaze was so serious, almost solemn, as he held Ratchet’s. “I promised you that I can do this without hurting you, and I meant it. But I need you to open this so I can make good on that promise.”

Ratchet’s vents ran a slow cycle, in and out, and he finally closed his optics and nodded. This was why he was here, after all, and even if this hurt, he had no doubt that Drift could make him forget about the discomfort in seconds flat. He just needed look past the next few moments to focus on what would happen after his seal was finally gone. “I trust you, Drift,” he said, and forced himself to remove the overrides keeping his panel shut.

Just as he’d expected, his panel instantly snapped aside, his spike cover spiraliing open almost simultaneously, and Ratchet kept his optics closed and his vents deep and slow as he braced himself for pain. Drift’s hand moved as his inner cover fully retracted and Ratchet had a split second to wonder if he was going to block his spike housing again, and how he planned to remove the seal if he had to keep his hand pressed over it like that.

But Drift’s hand didn’t cover his housing. 

And yet Ratchet’s spike didn’t move.

After a moment, he dared to open his optics to find Drift smiling down at him. “How--?”

Drift kissed him softly and guided his hand down until his fingertips encountered a small, flat object magnetized to the plating just above his spike housing. “Localized stasis device,” he said against Ratchet’s lips, nibbling his lower lip for an instant, swiping his glossa over the sting. “It’s similar to the kind of cog-lock used to stop prisoners from transforming, but this one is more… _specialized._ This little treasure will prevent your spike from pressurizing, but without affecting sensation.”

Ratchet’s eyebrows shot up and he pulled away from those teasing almost-kisses to stare at Drift as his own diagnostics examined his frame’s reaction to the little device and confirmed that it did exactly what Drift had said. “Do I want to know why you even _have_ something like this?”

Drift chuckled. “Don’t kink-shame me, Ratch,” he scolded teasingly, releasing Ratchet’s hand and sliding his palms over his belly instead. Whatever look came over Ratchet’s face at that made Drift laugh again. He kissed the tip of Ratchet’s nose again, looking far too pleased with himself. “Think about last night, Ratchet… spike restraint can be fun.”

Ratchet’s systems triggered an automatic coolant flush at the rush of heat that swamped him at the memory of just how hard he’d overloaded last night, but just because the Party Ambulance reputation was all fake, it didn’t mean he wasn’t fully aware of exactly what all the kinky stories attributed to him entailed, and he’d been a medic far too long not to have treated plenty of mecha for ill-advised interface injuries. More than a few of them had involved handmade frag toys. “I’ve never heard of a device like this. Where did you even get something like this? Are you sure it’s _safe?”_ he asked, because while this seemed like a perfect solution, he wasn’t about to risk his spike on something Drift had found at a street vendor in Hedonia, especially before he’d even gotten to _use_ it!

Drift just laughed again, damn him. “Don’t worry,” he said, his voice dropping to something low and promising as his hands continued meandering their _very distracting_ path over his plating. “Perceptor makes _all_ the best toys.” And he kissed Ratchet before he could reply.

And this kiss, _finally,_ was long and deep and passionate and everything Ratchet had been craving, and he gave up on questions in favor of making sure he gave just as good as he got. Drift groaned and kissed him again, fingertips tracing thrilling paths over seams across his hips. His hands itched to touch in return and he raised them to Drift’s shoulders, but Drift caught his wrists and guided his hands down to his thighs instead. “Touch me like you _want_ me, Ratch,” he growled against Ratchet’s lips, accent slipping just as it had last night, Rodion-rough beneath the polish of New Crystal City, and he couldn’t help what that did to him.

And he didn’t have to _worry_ about what it did to him either, because Drift had ensured that nothing would break his seals until he was ready for it.

Ratchet swept his hands over Drift’s thighs, glossy curves smooth and intoxicating under his palms as he swept them down; even more breathtaking when he increased the sensitivity of his hands on the return stroke back up. He moaned into the kiss and abandoned himself to it, to the heat of Drift’s mouth and the sleek seduction of his curves and the _desire_ and _desire_ and _desire_ of his field, endless, more than enough to drown in, and he breathed, “I do want you, I do," between kisses and let himself be swept away in the tide of Drift’s passion.

Drift pressed as close as he could get, armor flaring, hands tightening, but Ratchet could still feel the tremors that shook them. “Tell me one more time,” he whispered, hands sweeping up to frame his face, optics overbright and sharp as they held Ratchet’s. “Tell me what you want, Ratchet.”

 _Last chance to back out,_ Ratchet thought, and this was further than he’d ever gone before, far past the point when he usually ran, and he appreciated Drift making sure he was truly certain, he _did,_ but Ratchet had been certain even before he’d come to Drift’s door. 

Maybe even before he’d gone to Swerve’s last night.

“I want this,” Ratchet said through the static clouding his vocalizer, his field reinforcing his words with waves of _aroused/certain/eager_ interweaving with Drift’s. “I’ve waited so long--I want to finally know what I’ve been missing all these years.”

Drift shuddered and Ratchet kissed him, deep and hungry, and only pulled away to whisper against his lips. “I want you to take me to your berth, Drift,” he breathed. “I want you to show me all the things you promised. I want to discover it with you. _Teach me._ Please.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me @ me: HOW DID YOU WRITE NEARLY 5K AND THEY ARE _STILL NOT FRAGGING?!?!_ THIS IS THE _OPPOSITE_ OF YOUR USUAL PROBLEM WHAT IS GOING ONNNNNNNNNNN
> 
> also me @ me: ... well at least they're getting closer to it... *grumblemumblegrowl*
> 
> And here's your song lyrics, originally by Nat King Cole but I love Amy Winehouse's version even more and recommend it highly: https://songmeanings.com/songs/view/3530822107858741737/
> 
> (& if anyone wants to see that EPIC TWITTER THREAD check here! https://twitter.com/protectobots_/status/1175491962725527552?s=19 )


	7. Supernova

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Drowning in a haze, and I just want to get in deeper, deeper, deeper, deeper...
> 
> Like thunder screaming out for a flash of lightning  
> Stars are falling down for God's applause  
> I'm waiting for the light of your supernova, your last goodbye
> 
> I waited for you...
> 
> ~ Supernova, Within Temptation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This Thanksgiving I am thankful for the wonderful people I've met through the Transformers fandom, and for all the ways that this fandom has utterly ruined me (such as never being able to see the word "valve" in any context whatsoever without snickering like a lunatic, and let's not even discuss the poor, poor characters Overload and Spike... their suffering is Real). I am thankful for Dratchet and all the happiness this ship has brought me, and most especially I'm thankful that all of you have been so understanding and patient with me as I've struggled to get this chapter written!
> 
> So to all of you, Happy Thanksgiving!

Ratchet had known Drift was the right choice to be his first lover--and oh, just _thinking_ of him that way was enough to send a shiver through him--long before Drift had paused to ask him one last time. Ratchet’s hands had been eagerly mapping his frame as Drift straddled his thighs, his panel already open and his vents blowing hot, kissing Drift with everything in him, and Drift had still given him one last chance to back out if he’d been having second thoughts.

If Ratchet _had_ been, that moment would have been enough to reassure him that yes, _yes,_ Drift was the right choice. 

When Ratchet had answered, he’d done his best to make sure that Drift understood there was no doubt in his mind, and he’d expected Drift to respond with the same overwhelming passion he’d shown last night in Ratchet’s quarters. He’d expected more of the speedster’s fiery kisses and skillful touches that wiped his processor clean of anything but pleasure. He’d expected… well, not to put too fine a point on it, Ratchet had fully expected Drift to _ravish him._

But instead, Drift cupped Ratchet’s helm in gentle hands, pressed a kiss to the center of his chevron, held him just like that for a moment as his field enveloped Ratchet in a wordless embrace of _honored_ and _tenderness_ and _thank you._

And that was more intimate than any overwhelmingly passionate kiss could ever be.

He hadn’t recovered from it by the time Drift stood and pulled Ratchet to his feet with one hand, scooping up his untouched energon with the other. “Come on, then,” he said as he finally, _finally_ tugged Ratchet toward his berth, optics bright, lips curved in a devastating smile, and all of it together was almost enough to make Ratchet forget to be anxious. 

_Almost._

Drift paused and raised an eyebrow as though sensing the return of his nervousness, studying him critically. “Hmm," he said, walking backwards now to watch Ratchet following him. "You're not stumbling this time. Clearly I need to make more of an effort.” 

Ratchet rolled his optics at the teasing tone even as he was grateful for the return to the familiar territory of their usual snarking. "I was not _stumbling_ last night," he growled, knowing damn well that he'd been stumbling. Slag, by the time Drift had gotten through with him last night, he’d barely remembered that he _had_ knees, much less how they worked.

Drift laughed and shook his head, optics shading fondness over desire. "Oh, very clever," he teased as he reached his berth and leaned against it to pull Ratchet to stand between his parted thighs. "Now I'll just have to prove that I can make you stumble all over again. Nice plan, Ratch." Ratchet snorted and Drift set his energon on the cabinet beside the berth so he could put both hands on Ratchet's waist, pulling him even closer.

Ratchet's bared array pressed against the speedster's warm panel and he couldn't have choked off the hungry growl of his engine if he'd tried. Drift grinned at the sound, a dead giveaway of just how incredibly hot Ratchet was running already, and he glanced over at the thick consistency of the additive-heavy fuel in search of a distraction from the blush he felt spreading over his plating. “What did you _do_ to that stuff?” 

Instead of answering him Drift kissed him, legs wrapping around his hips and tightening, glossa sweeping deep and fueling the blaze scorching Ratchet’s lines, and as distractions went, this was one he couldn't say he minded in the least. He reached for one of Drift's shoulders again, sliding his fingertips beneath the swooping fender in search of the hidden spots that had made him shudder last night while his other hand slid down to find the biolights half-hidden behind his chestplate. Drift purred his approval. “You’ll see,” Drift murmured when he broke the kiss at last. “Hold on tight.”

Ratchet’s brows drew together at that. “Why--” he began, but immediately got his answer when Drift’s arms and legs abruptly clamped around him and suddenly he found himself pulled completely off his feet. He yelped, grabbing on tight as Drift used his leverage to spin Ratchet and roll with him. In the next instant, he found himself flat on his back in Drift’s berth with the speedster perched atop him, grinning down and really looking far too pleased with himself. “Show-off,” Ratchet accused, but his systems only revved harder at the way Drift had so effectively manhandled him and he was fairly certain Drift wasn’t buying his grumpy act in the least.

“Oh yes,” Drift agreed, still grinning as he shifted to stretch full-length atop Ratchet. “Brace yourself because I plan to show off for you quite a bit more tonight.”

Ratchet couldn’t reply, too distracted by the slide of those sleek curves over his plating. _I’m really doing this,_ he thought, and although he almost immediately felt stupid for the awed disbelief that still filled him at the thought, he couldn’t help it. Drift lay atop him in this decadent berth like a fantasy come to life, offering everything he’d spent his entire life missing out on, and this was real, Ratchet was _really doing this._

Drift slid his palms over Ratchet's arms and pulled his hands away from the speedster’s shoulders to draw them up over his helm. Ratchet allowed it, knowing his movements weren’t nearly as graceful as Drift’s had been, and also knowing that it didn’t matter because the heat in Drift’s optics only grew. He vented deeply, let Drift move him as he liked, reveling in the _desire_ and _anticipation_ in Drift’s field as he bent to kiss Ratchet again, and _yes, he was doing this._

And he could almost be glad for all the years he’d waited, because it meant that he got to have this perfect moment now.

Drift moaned into the kiss, hands sliding down his arms again and over the smooth expanse of his windshield. “Primus, I can’t believe you’re really here in my berth,” he whispered, sounding almost as awed as Ratchet felt.

That blush threatened to spread over his face again and Ratchet again took refuge in the familiar territory of needling Drift. “I can’t believe your berth is this decadent. I was picturing a barren slab to represent some nonsense about giving up worldly pleasures,” Ratchet said, although it certainly wasn’t a complaint. “Probably surrounded by crystals.”

Drift laughed. “If you want crystals, I can certainly oblige,” he replied, thighs parting to frame Ratchet’s hips and utterly derailing his thoughts. His lips quirked, clearly knowing exactly what effect he was having on the medic. “And luckily for both of us, my faith doesn’t require me to sacrifice _pleasures.”_

Anything Ratchet might’ve said to that--not that he was spending much processor space on formulating a reply when it was so much better used to concentrate on the way Drift’s plating felt against his--was interrupted when Drift’s hips rocked against his, rolling his panel over Ratchet’s array, surprising a moan from him at how much warmer Drift’s panel was now than just minutes ago. Ratchet’s hands instinctively went to Drift’s hips and the rush of pleasurable feedback reminded him that he’d still left the sensitivity increased. He couldn’t help himself, slid his hands down to those tempting tires set high on Drift’s thighs, _squeezed_ and made them both gasp.

“There’s probably a witty response to that somewhere but I don’t give a slag, you can win this one, why aren’t you kissing me?” Ratchet demanded breathlessly, and Drift laughed again as he bent down and kissed him.

And Ratchet quit trying to think at all.

All that mattered were Drift’s kisses, deep and hungry and all-consuming. Soon enough his entire universe contracted down to this berth and Drift’s weight atop his frame, his taste, the way his engine surged with every gasp or moan he drew from Ratchet, the sleek perfection of him beneath Ratchet’s hands, the caresses he drew over Ratchet’s frame in return.

He had no idea how much time passed this way--not enough, surely--before Drift broke away to kiss his throat. Gasping for air to supplement his straining cooling fans, Ratchet tipped his head to the side to give Drift all the access he could want. _Frag_ but the speedster had clever hands, mapping the seams in his armor, finding sensitive spots that not even Ratchet knew were there, teasing just enough to leave him feeling hypersensitive all over and trembling with anticipation for the next touch, and the next, and the next. Soon enough Ratchet was having trouble keeping still beneath Drift, his frame wanting to arch and twist to follow each caress, and all the while Drift’s mouth never stopped its sensual assault on his throat.

So he noticed instantly when one hand left his plating and didn’t return.

But the involuntary whine of protest that escaped him was a surprise.

Drift nipped the edge of his audial and made him jump. “Primus, that’s so fragging hot,” he murmured as he pressed a knee between Ratchet’s thighs. “Gonna have to make you do that again.”

Ratchet knew his faceplate had to be glowing with the intensity of his blush by now but he couldn’t seem to stop it. “Still showing off?” he managed, hoping he could at least _pretend_ he wasn’t more revved up from just these few kisses and caresses than he’d ever been in his life.

Drift pulled back just enough to grin down at him, and Ratchet could swear he felt his spark tremble in its crystal because that was Deadlock in that grin. “Oh, Ratchet,” he purred, low and predatory and so sexy Ratchet damn near whined all over again, “I am gonna _blow your fucking mind.”_

And somehow the human profanity added an edge to that promise that made Ratchet shudder from head to foot. Drift’s grin sharpened when he felt it and Ratchet couldn’t hold that gaze, couldn’t watch Drift looking at him like he was going to eat him alive and make him love every second of it, couldn’t handle it _at all_ so he grabbed Drift’s helm and pulled him down until he could taste that dangerous smile.

\--only to almost _jump out of his plating_ when Drift’s hand finally returned and traced a teasing circle around the rim of his valve seal. Drift’s field went _smug/pleased_ at the reaction and Ratchet bit his lip in retaliation, because he had to do _something_ or he’d fall apart.

He remembered a moment later how intensely Drift had reacted when he’d bitten his lip last night when Drift's engine revved _hard_ and clearly he had a thing for biting because Drift kissed him again, deep and passionate and dominant and _glorious_ and oh he was absolutely going to bite Drift again if it got this kind of reaction because _fragging hell--_

But even that thought stood no chance against the rush of heat that shot through him when Drift’s fingers returned to his array, pressing more firmly against the seal, rubbing insistent circles around the rim.

So with this kind of distraction, Ratchet thought he could be forgiven for how long it took him to realize that Drift was actually massaging something slick and warm over the seal. He broke the kiss with a gasp and forced his optics online as Drift’s hand left his array again, watching him reach toward the berthside cabinet and dip his fingers in the thick energon before returning to his seal once more. He opened his mouth to ask a question, but Drift’s fingers flirted over his node this time and his words died in a loud moan that crackled with static.

“Oh yeah, that’s it, sing pretty for me,” Drift purred and now Ratchet really _did_ whine again. Drift rewarded him with another caress across his node and answered the question he couldn’t concentrate enough to ask. “It’s a special mix of additives that combines with energon and softens the silicone of your seal,” he said as though he wasn’t rubbing circles over Ratchet’s node and making him all but writhe beneath him. Ratchet couldn’t keep his optics online, couldn’t stop moaning, couldn’t be still as the pleasure built and built and Drift’s field poured _heat_ and _lust_ into his. “Tastes good too,” Drift added, and that barely registered as overload rushed closer and Ratchet grabbed the headboard, desperate to ground himself.

In fact, the only reason the words registered at all was because Drift pulled his fingers away at the last possible moment, shocking his processor back online. Drift waited long enough for Ratchet to get his optics online before he licked his fingers clean, glossa curling around them like something obscene and holding Ratchet’s gaze the entire time before he kissed Ratchet deep, muffling Ratchet’s moan against his mouth.

And while the sharp/sweet flavor of the energon mixture on Drift’s glossa _did_ taste good and Drift’s kisses were an addiction all their own, Ratchet had been _right there_ and his overheated frame ached for the overload he’d been denied. He arched and felt Drift’s knee against his thigh, tried to press his valve against it and groaned in frustration when Drift gripped his hip tight and pinned him in place, preventing him from moving the way he needed to. Frustrated, determined to get even, Ratchet reached up to the graceful, sensor-packed finials on Drift’s helm, traced the ghost of a caress from base to point on both sides and lightly pinched the tips at the end.

Drift’s reaction was _extremely_ satisfying, shuddering hard and moaning into Ratchet’s mouth. He did it again, this time gliding that barely-there caress up the inner sides. Drift’s engine roared and he kissed Ratchet again, field surging against Ratchet’s, _desire/awe/need/heat_ echoing back and forth between them in an ever-increasing feedback loop unlike anything Ratchet had ever imagined. Moaning, desperately aroused, drowning in sensation, Ratchet gasped when Drift abruptly broke the kiss with a growl. He opened his optics in time to see Drift snatch up the cube and take a quick swig.

And when he pushed Ratchet’s thighs further apart, wedged his shoulders between them, and pressed his open mouth against Ratchet’s valve seal, Ratchet didn’t whine or moan.

He _shouted_ Drift’s name to the ceiling, completely unheeding of who might hear.

Drift growled again, the contact of his mouth against Ratchet’s plating sending the deep vibration through his entire array, and Ratchet’s optics briefly whited out with static at the intensity of the pleasure. His temperature trembled at red line, his coolant near boiling point, and when Drift’s glossa pressed against his seal he swore he could feel it warming and softening as the energon blend worked on the silicone, or was that just his frame overheating? He didn’t know, couldn’t care, could only cry out with each swipe of Drift’s glossa over his seal and hold onto the headboard with both hands as though that would be enough to keep him from flying apart.

But yet again, just before overload would’ve crashed over him, Drift pulled away and left him aching and desperate. “Drift, _please!”_ Ratchet cried, completely beyond reserve or pride.

Drift groaned but didn’t return to his valve. Instead he pinned Ratchet’s hips to the berth and took another mouthful from the cube before he pressed his mouth to Ratchet’s spike seal this time, giving it the same treatment he’d given his valve. Ratchet’s fans screamed in a futile attempt to cool him as his charge crackled higher, and just the sight of Drift dipping his fingers into the energon again before they disappeared back between this thighs was enough to make him nearly sob in anticipation.

But even the hot roll of the energon dripping over his aft from the erotic massage around his valve wasn’t enough to distract him from the press of Drift’s glossa against the tip of his spike though the seal.

He cried out again and again as Drift teased his spike though the seal. Deep beneath his plating he felt the tension that was his spike’s desperate attempt to extend despite the localized stasis field preventing it. That ache blended with the sharp pulses of pleasure from his spike tip into a potent mixture that soon overtook his entire universe. Drift was merciless, bringing him higher and higher only to back off just before the peak _again and again,_ and Ratchet was going to _fragging kill him_ if he didn’t let him overload soon!

When Drift chuckled, Ratchet realized he’d snarled that last thought aloud--realized he’d been alternately begging and cursing Drift for who knew how long now, by turns desperate and vicious. “Oh, you are fucking _gorgeous_ when you beg for me,” Drift said, raising his helm and grinning up at him and making Ratchet cry out in dismay when his fingers stopped rubbing his valve seal too, but despite his frustration the sound of Drift’s voice only added to his arousal because that husky, rough rasp was pure _Deadlock._ “I’m tempted to see how long I can keep you just like this.”

Ratchet let out a tormented moan. He didn’t know whether to beg or threaten, had no idea how to get Drift to stop edging him and give him the overload he yearned for. “Please,” he gasped, the word barely intelligible through static.

“Luckily for you,” Drift went on as though he hadn’t heard Ratchet’s plea, “I’ve got a much better plan.” He reached up, tugged the sheet from the desperate grip of Ratchet’s hand, replaced it with something else.

It took Ratchet entirely too long to figure out what the little scrap Drift pressed into his palm was. When he did, he gasped hard enough to shake his entire frame.

_His valve seal!_

He hadn’t even felt the tiniest pinch, much less the pain he’d heard about so many times, and he opened his mouth to say something only to throw his head back and cry out at the slow slide of Drift’s glossa over equipment that had never been touched before. “Oh frag,” he gasped, “oh frag, _oh frag Drift--”_

The next lick was slower, dipping just inside, and Ratchet keened, thighs shaking. Drift slid his arms beneath Ratchet’s thighs, curling his hands over the top, holding him still while he swirled his glossa around Ratchet’s anterior node before delving deeper inside. Ratchet’s helm thrashed on the pillow, utterly overwhelmed with sensation, and it kept building and building as Drift’s glossa got bolder, finding valve nodes and teasing them to sparking, glittering life.

And _yet again_ he eased up just before Ratchet would’ve tumbled over the edge into overload. “Such a pretty valve,” Drift murmured, pulling back to watch his fingers flirt over Ratchet’s overheated equipment. Ratchet was far beyond words and feeling one long finger slowly, slowly slide inside him didn’t help at all. His calipers clenched around it, gripping tight as Drift pulled his finger back, parting to welcome him back when it slid in again. “You’re even more gorgeous than I thought you’d be.”

Somehow Ratchet managed to choke out actual words. “Show me,” he gasped, because he knew every part of himself, had complete knowledge of his frame in every aspect but this. 

Drift’s field flared with desire at the request and an alert popped up on his HUD--an incoming data transfer requesting approval. He fumbled for an embarrassingly long time before finally accepting it, but this wasn’t an image capture of his valve.

It was a _live feed._

He choked out a groan as he watched Drift’s finger easing in and out of the--no, _his valve,_ that was _his valve,_ that was _his_ pristine white plating highlighted with red and white biolights surrounding the red-and-black inlaid entrance and crowned with a glowing white anterior node. “Oh, oh frag, oh _frag,”_ he gasped, helm dropping back and optics wide and unseeing as he watched Drift fingering him, watching the camera angle change, zooming in until he felt the long soft slide of Drift’s glossa over his valve. It felt somehow forbidden to watch like this, felt almost like voyeurism, but this was _him,_ this was _his frame_ he was watching Drift caress, that was _his valve_ that clenched in wanting when those fingers returned and pumped slowly in and out, two this time, scissoring inside him, making him shudder all over as the stretch activated nodes throughout his valve.

And all the while Drift’s field crackled and flared over his, his reaction to watching Ratchet watching _him_ filling his field with _lust_ and _need,_ an erotic mixture that only heightened Ratchet’s arousal still further. 

“Look here,” Drift said, and Ratchet watched his fingers slip free and trace the line of biolights from his glowing white node at the front of his valve down to the group of smaller biolights at the back. “You’re a lucky mech, see these?” He flicked his fingertips over those red biolights and bright, unexpected pleasure hit Ratchet hard enough to make him gasp and arch. And Drift kept rubbing his fingertips over them, quick little shocks of pleasure firing from each of them in turn as he spoke in that rough growl that sent a thrill all its own through Ratchet. “You have caudal nodes, natural caudal nodes and not just _one_ but _all of these,_ do you know how rare that is? You were _made_ for fragging, babe, you were made to love it, and oh you’re gonna fraggin’ _love_ my spike, Ratch, look--”

The feed blurred as Drift shifted up to his knees and Ratchet opened his optics to see Drift’s panel shift aside so his spike could extend into his hand, thick dark grey and red with gold biolights against his black palm. Drift stroked himself, staring down at Ratchet, watching Ratchet watch him, and whatever expression that Ratchet wore made a slow, wicked smile spread over his face. “Look,” he said again, and dragged a fingertip beneath his spike from the base all the way to the tip.

Over a series of ridges that Ratchet had no doubt would feel _incredible_ against those caudal nodes.

Ratchet swallowed hard but couldn’t fully mute a whimper as _anticipation/need/_ **_please_ ** saturated his field. Oh, he wanted to feel that spike inside him, wanted to know how it felt to have his calipers stretching around it as Drift sank deep, he wanted to feel those ridges, he wanted Drift so deep inside that he hit his ceiling node, he wanted, he _wanted,_ and he reached out, beyond words, until his hand touched Drift’s.

Drift inhaled sharply and covered Ratchet’s hand with his own, but apart from that, he let Ratchet explore his spike at his own pace. Ratchet couldn’t tear his optics away from the sight of his red fingers wrapping around that dark spike when he stroked it the same way Drift had, slowly from base to tip and back again. 

“Frag, oh _Primus,”_ Drift groaned, engine surging when Ratchet did it again, finding a rhythm that felt amazing against the sensors in his hand. Drift's hips rocked in time with Ratchet’s strokes. “Fragging hell, oh _fuck_ Ratchet!”

“Come on,” Ratchet said, and he tried to make it commanding, he _tried,_ but it came out sounding far more like _desperation._ “Come on, Drift, stop teasing, come on and _frag me_ already, _please!”_

Drift’s engine _roared._

An instant later Drift had Ratchet’s wrists pinned to the berth beside his hips as he dove down again, mouth insistent and _hungry_ against his valve, and Ratchet cried out again and again, chanting Drift’s name over and over, begging for mercy, for the overload he’d been denied so many times.

And this time when the peak approached, Drift didn’t stop.

Ratchet’s frame arched hard and locked, lightning bursting from his spark and shooting through him as the long-delayed overload finally, _finally_ overtook him. Drift suckled his node and plunged two fingers inside him, pushing him higher still, pleasure scorching through him in lines of fire, bursts of charge crackling over his armor and down to Drift’s, shattering him, addicting him, tearing cries from his vocalizer again and again as he begged Drift not to stop, don’t stop, _don’t stop--_

When Drift’s mouth left him Ratchet cried out in desperation because his frame still crackled with charge, he wasn’t _finished,_ but Drift pushed Ratchet’s thighs further apart and pressed forward. Ratchet gasped and grabbed desperately at his lover as the hot length of Drift’s spike rocked over his valve, ridges against nodes, electricity leaping between them, and Ratchet couldn’t keep his hips still, couldn’t stop himself from following, from trying to get that spike where he _needed_ it.

And then Drift shifted, his spike lining up perfectly, and the next time he rocked forward, his spike slowly breached Ratchet’s valve.

“Oh please,” Ratchet gasped, hardly aware of his legs wrapping around Drift’s hips, his entire being focused on the incredible feeling between his thighs. “Oh please, oh please, oh please Drift, oh Drift!”

Drift kissed him hard and deep, possessive and perfect as he rocked back and thrust forward again, spike sinking deeper this time. Ratchet moaned into his mouth and shook as his calipers parted around Drift’s thickness, as he stroked charge deeper into Ratchet’s valve than his fingers had been able to reach. “Oh you’re perfect,” Drift groaned in his audial when he broke the kiss, rocking back and thrusting forward again, holding Ratchet tight as he shuddered and cried out when Drift was fully seated at last. “You feel so good, Ratch, oh you feel so _fucking_ good, so perfect--”

Ratchet had no processor power to spare to reply in kind, too enthralled by the new sensations, too overwhelmed with wave after wave of pleasure when at last Drift started to move in earnest and Ratchet overloaded again almost immediately, and then again as Drift kept up his pace throughout it. All he could do was hold on tight, awed by the dancing colors outside the window and the thrilling sensations inside him, completely in Drift’s power, begging him for more and crying out in bliss as Drift gave it to him, gave him everything he could want.

When Drift’s overload took him at last Ratchet forced his dazzled optics to focus long enough to see the ecstasy on his beautiful face as heat and charge burst through his valve and sent a shimmering aftershock of pleasure through Ratchet one last time.

And then Drift half-collapsed atop him, fans roaring as hard as Ratchet’s if not even harder. “Fucking _hell,”_ he gasped, holding himself up on one trembling arm for a moment longer before giving up and falling atop Ratchet in a limp, overheated, shaking pile of sated speedster. “Primus fragging _fuck,_ that was incredible.”

Ratchet laughed breathlessly and hugged Drift as well as he could with arms that felt like they’d never move right again. “You swear a _lot_ in the berth, you know that?” he managed, laughing again and having absolutely no idea why, but the delight bubbling up through him demanded an outlet and he couldn’t stop. “You swear a lot _in English_ in the berth, what the frag is that about?”

“Yeah yeah, fucking sue the motherfucking goddamn shit out of me, and you have no fucking room to criticize, you’re worse than me in the _medbay_ and at least I’m in my own fucking hab,” Drift grumbled into his shoulder, and that only made Ratchet laugh harder. Drift snorted and raised his helm with clear effort to look down at him, watching him try to contain his giggles for a moment and quirking an eyebrow in amusement when the effort utterly failed. “Damn, Ratch, did I break you?”

Ratchet pressed his lips together and shook his head, trying hard to get himself together, but he only succeeded for a handful of seconds before the giggles burst free again. 

Drift facepalmed. “Yeah, I broke you. I actually _broke you,_ frag me running, I’m gonna have to tell Rodimus--no, I’m gonna have to tell _Magnus_ that I broke the Chief Medical Officer with my spike,” Drift groaned, but he didn’t sound the slightest bit upset about that prospect. In fact, if Ratchet had to guess, he’d say he sounded a lot more like--

“You're such a smug fragger,” he snickered, and Drift grinned that feral grin down at him and denied nothing.

And Ratchet had never imagined that he’d giggle like a lunatic after finally interfacing for the first time, but in this moment, with his frame shimmering with the strut-deep satisfaction that only came from getting _spectacularly_ laid, a satisfaction he’d waited his entire life to feel, Ratchet lay beneath his lover and stopped trying to stifle it. Drift rolled his optics and shook his head and held him close with _care_ and _tenderness_ and _amusement_ in his own field, and this reality was better than any fantasy he’d ever had.

Ratchet pressed his face against Drift’s shoulder and _laughed._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (... and let's be perfectly honest here, Ratchet is thankful that I finally got this chapter done because HE HAS WAITED LONG ENOUGH TO GET LAID PRIMUSDAMMIT)
> 
> Also can you imagine how much money is in Drift's swear jar? He probably bought the _Lost Light_ with swear jar money, holy shit Drift, why the hell are you cussing so damn much in this fic, where the fuck did you learn that shit huh???


	8. Forgot About the Sun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Did I forget who I am  
>  Did I forget about the sun  
> Did I fall so deep  
> (I wish) my heart could not break apart_  
>    
> _This is my call, my call for help  
>  You are the one and I can tell  
> I take a breath and I dive in  
> Did I forget that I can't swim_
> 
> ~ Forgot About the Sun, The Last Element

_Oh Primus, I'm in trouble._

Drift knew that he was setting himself up for a fall that would do nothing but hurt, knew that every second he spent holding Ratchet close and watching him sleeping in his arms would only make it worse.

But he couldn't bear to look away.

Ratchet was _smiling._

Drift vented softly, keeping his engine idling at the same low purr, not wanting to wake Ratchet and miss a moment of this, no matter how unwise it was. Ratchet was so incredibly beautiful, and whether he saw it in himself or not, Drift had always seen it. His rugged, handsome face, the breadth of his shoulders, the strength and sturdiness of his frame… oh, he was so gorgeous that Drift could hardly stand it.

And somehow this amazing mech was here in Drift's berth, curled against him, engine humming low with contentment. Drift burned this precious moment into his memory banks: the medic resting with his helm on Drift’s shoulder, one arm draped around his waist, the other curled beneath him, recharging with a soft, peaceful smile unlike any expression Drift had ever seen on his face.

And Drift had put it there.

This perfect moment joined Drift’s memory of the flavor of Ratchet’s EM projections after they’d interfaced. The _joy_ in Ratchet's laughter and in his field, the _relief_ and _wonder,_ as though an enormous weight had finally been lifted… Drift was still awed that _he_ had given Ratchet such happiness. He dared to raise a hand to stroke Ratchet’s cheek, softly, so softly, not wanting to wake him, just needing to _touch,_ to assure himself that this was real. 

Ratchet sighed, snuggled a little closer, and went still again… still smiling.

Drift’s hand curled into a fist, trembling with the force of his emotions.

 _Don’t want more,_ he mentally repeated for what had to be the hundredth time--the reminder had become a mantra. _Be grateful for this. Treasure each moment as it comes and never forget that you will have to let him go when it’s over. Don’t ask for more than what you’ve been given, that’s a road that goes nowhere and you know it._

But another voice rose within him, one he’d worked hard to convince himself no longer existed. 

_Deadlock._

That voice urged a far different course of action. _Take anything he’ll give you,_ Deadlock purred, _take everything you can get. He wants this, wants_ you, _and you know how to use that. You know you_ want _to use that, no matter how many pretty words you wrap around it, so stop lying to yourself. He wants you, trusts you, and you want him so bad it hurts, so for fuck’s sake_ keep _him! Make him yours and hold on hard, fight like hell until you’re_ forced _to let go!_

Drift had been spending a lot of time resisting those urges ever since Ratchet had confessed his secret.

But.

Oh, _but._

There were so many thoughts that wanted to fill the space after that one tiny word that he could barely articulate any of them, not even to himself. So much he felt, so much he wanted to say, so much he didn't dare to, so many edges just waiting to cut him open and make him bleed.

Sweet Primus below, making love to Ratchet was _incredible._ Ratchet had spent so many years hiding away and avoiding the slightest hint of intimacy that Drift had expected that he’d be shy in the berth, that Drift would need to use all his patience and skill to persuade Ratchet to let go of his inhibitions and give in to pleasure. 

Instead, Ratchet had thrown himself into interfacing with abandon, his reactions open and unfeigned, his surrender freely given.

And oh, the things Deadlock wanted to do with that beautiful, precious surrender… 

Drift cut that thought off sharply. _No. I am_ not _Deadlock anymore!_

That inner voice mocked him. _Oh yes, you like to say you’re_ Drift _again, don’t you. Drift, the obedient little Autobot, the hippie spiritualist, so_ harmless. _You’d like to think you can remake your spark as easy as the Circle remade your frame, but you were Deadlock for over four million years. Didya really think you got rid of me just cuz you answer to a different name now?_

It could never be that easy. No matter how hard Drift tried to stop it, something of Deadlock always slipped through.

 _Especially_ in the berth. Drift had tried, oh how he'd tried, but he'd been a Decepticon when he'd learned to enjoy interfacing, and those things were forever tangled together in his mind. He knew he hadn’t controlled himself nearly as well as he should have when they'd interfaced, had certainly shown more of his… less civilized… impulses than was wise, had let more of _Deadlock_ show than he should have. All Drift could do was thank Primus that Ratchet hadn’t been disgusted by it. 

But Ratchet’s acceptance had only made Drift’s struggle against his darker desires more difficult. He’d spent millions of years as Deadlock, had been immersed in ‘Con culture from the very beginning, and the desire to scratch, to _bite,_ had been nearly impossible to resist. Not to harm, never that, but to _mark._

To _claim._

Drift couldn’t, _couldn’t_ do that. For one thing, mating marks weren’t an Autobot custom as they’d been with the Decepticons, and even if they had been, Drift kept reminding himself that he didn’t have that right. Ratchet had come to him for a very specific reason--because he _trusted_ Drift to introduce him to interfacing, to take his seals the right way.

And to keep his damn mouth shut afterward.

That Ratchet hadn’t outright said as much didn’t make it any less true. He’d kept this secret for his entire life, hidden it out of shame and fear. Ratchet hadn’t wanted _anyone_ to know that he’d waited this long to lose his seals. Drift was positive he wouldn’t appreciate it if anyone found out that he’d spent the quarantine in Drift’s quarters, and if Ratchet emerged bearing the marks of Drift’s claws and teeth? There were enough former Decepticons on this ship who would know _exactly_ what those marks meant that they might as well announce it over ship-wide comms, and Ratchet had made it very clear that he hated his interface habits being the subject of rumors.

And Drift knew exactly how that felt.

When Drift had become Deadlock and finally escaped the gutters of the Dead End, he’d naively thought he could shrug off his past as easily as he’d shrugged off his name. That hadn’t lasted, though. All it had taken was overhearing a mech telling his friends just where he recognized Deadlock from and Deadlock damn near tearing him to pieces for it for him to realize that the only way to rid himself of his past experiences was to _deal with it._

Perhaps unsurprisingly, he had found himself less than enthusiastic about the prospect.

It had actually been Starscream, of all mecha, who’d taken him aside one day, long before Megatron had driven a wedge between his officers to ensure none of them would work together against him. Drift didn’t remember exactly how the conversation had started, but he _vividly_ remembered the way it had escalated when the subject of the rumors had come up. 

“Look, everyone knows you were a buymech, so what?” Starscream had snapped with the blunt manner that never did win him any friends. “You’re hardly the only one in the Decepticons. No one who matters cares!”

Deadlock hadn’t known whether to snarl or laugh. He’d settled for throwing himself into a chair in a deliberately disrespectful slouch. “That must be why all the rumors have died out,” he’d said sarcastically. “Gosh, thanks for solving that problem for me. I’m sure no one will ever mention it again.”

Starscream waved his sarcasm away. “You want to end the rumors? _Get. Slagging. Laid!”_ That suggestion had caught him completely off-guard, and Deadlock recoiled. Starscream pointed a talon at him. “See? _That!_ That’s why they talk, because the rumors say you’ve fragged a thousand mecha but you act like you’re scared to so much as touch another mech now. They only talk because they know it gets under your plating, so if you want them to stop, frelling get _over_ it!”

Deadlock _had_ snarled at that. “You have no idea,” he’d growled, surging to his feet and getting up in Starscream’s face. “No sludging _idea_ what my life was like! You think you can order me to _get laid_ cuz, what? You outrank me now? Well I got some news for you, _Screamer,_ you don’t know _slag_ and no one gets to tell me who to frag anymore!”

Starscream didn’t back down. In fact, he’d stepped forward with a sneer. “Oh, I don’t know slag, is that right? Why do you think the sick bastards in the Towers bought themselves so many cold-constructed Seekers, huh?” And that had hit Deadlock like a punch, but Starscream wasn’t done. “I _wish_ I didn’t know slag, but I don’t let it _rule me_ like you do!”

Deadlock had actually taken a step back, one of the very few times he’d ever backed down from a confrontation. He’d heard a thousand different rumors about Starscream, but this? This wasn’t one of them.

And Deadlock abruptly understood that the rumors circulating about him were hurting Starscream, too, that when the other ‘Cons mocked Deadlock, it brought up things Starscream was also trying to forget.

Deadlock hadn’t been good at thinking before he spoke back then, but he’d done his best. He hadn’t retracted his claws or softened his snarl, but after a moment he’d glared up at Starscream and said through gritted denta, _“How?”_

Starscream hadn’t eased his aggressive posture one bit either, but he’d also lowered his voice to answer. “I already told you, pick a pretty mech and _get laid,”_ he’d said flatly. “There has to be _someone_ on this base who you could stand to have touch you. It doesn't have to be terrible, you know. Figure out what you like, not just what you hate.” Then he’d grinned, baring his fangs in an expression more bloodthirsty than amused. “Think of it this way: are you really going to let those slag sucking bastards have that power over you forever, or are you going to take it back from them? Are you going to let them _win?”_

He’d thought about Starscream’s words for a few moments, and then Deadlock gave the Seeker a speculative look. Back then he’d actually _liked_ Starscream, as hard as it was to believe now, both liked and _trusted_ him. That last bit was what decided him. “You busy later?” 

Starscream had laughed and looked him up and down before smirking. “Persuade me.”

That had been the start of a whole lot of trial and error, but Deadlock had discovered that when it was on his terms, he actually enjoyed interfacing. He enjoyed it rather a lot, actually, and Starscream had been right--the buymech rumors mostly died out when the ‘Cons had juicier topics to whisper over. Topics like who Deadlock’s latest frag had been, and whether he was really going to frag his way through the entire army, and most of all, who he would choose next… and hoping it would be them.

But of all the rumors circulating, Deadlock had never heard a single one that connected him to Starscream. Most ‘Cons thought the Seeker couldn’t keep his mouth shut to save his life, but he never said a single word about the nights when Deadlock had snuck into his berth, about the times he'd lashed out, or worse, the times he'd cried. He wasn’t sure if it was to preserve Starscream’s reputation or his, but either way, Deadlock hadn’t questioned his luck. After all, it wasn’t like he’d never been someone’s secret frag before, and he’d appreciated Starscream’s discretion in never mentioning how halting and hesitant he’d been when he was trying to unlearn everything he’d ever known about interfacing.

So Drift understood exactly why Ratchet wouldn’t want anyone to know about this now. He'd been there himself so many years ago, and despite everything that had happened between himself and Starscream since those days, the Seeker had kept his secret. Drift would do the same for Ratchet now, and that meant _not_ giving in to the urge to mark Ratchet as his own, no matter how Deadlock howled inside him.

 _He’s not mine,_ he told the inner Deadlock ruthlessly, and ignored the stab of pain in his spark. _He’s giving me more than I could ever have hoped for--why can’t you be content with that? Greed never took me anywhere good!_

No, Drift had to keep in mind that no matter what his own spark wanted, this was purely physical. Besides, he couldn’t be sure that Ratchet didn’t have his spark set on someone else. Drift had heard rumors even beyond the standard Party Ambulance fare, whispers that hinted of a romance between Ratchet and Ironhide, or Wheeljack, or even Optimus Prime. Once he was free of his seals and all the emotional baggage that went with them, Ratchet might very well be eager to start a relationship with someone he actually had romantic feelings for, and Drift would have to step aside and let him do it. He was nothing more than a friend doing a favor. He had no right to object.

So Drift shoved Deadlock's tempting voice down as hard as he could, fought against the desire to _take_ and _claim_ and _keep._ None of that was going to happen, and he’d learned the hard way that wishing for the impossible would bring him nothing but disappointment and misery.

 _Be content with what you’re given,_ Drift repeated again, willing himself to accept it. _These three days with him are a gift from Primus. Don’t ask for more. You know you won’t get it. Be grateful that you’ve been given this much. Don’t want more…_

Drift stroked Ratchet’s cheek again, just brushing the corner of his mouth with his thumb, and that beautiful, peaceful, trusting smile never faded.

And Drift _wanted more_ harder than he ever had in his life.

 _Oh yeah,_ he thought, finally letting his helm thump back onto the pillow. _This is gonna hurt._

After all, falling felt like flying right up until the impact.

But at least he could agree with Deadlock about one thing.

_If I’m going to crash and burn, I might as well get everything I can out of every second._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _They say that all good things  
>  They come to an end  
> It took some time  
> But now I understand  
> There's no way to stop me..._
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=Qa3zv3nEgA8
> 
> Thank you all for your patience while I wrestled with this chapter and all the madness going on in the world right now. Please keep yourselves safe and healthy.


End file.
